


Shameless: The Mickey Milkovich Story; Season 3

by FistfulofDollars



Series: Shameless: The Mickey Milkovich Story [3]
Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: (M/F) Angie/Mickey, Canon-typical physical altercations between Ian and Mickey, Drug Dealing, Drug Use, Explicit descriptions of Violence from Terry, Homophobia, Homophobic Slurs, Ian is underage, It's really a sad season after 3x6 :(, Later in the season there will be:, M/M, Mickey having to live with and marry the woman that raped him, Mickey isn't, Rape (Mickey/Svetlana), Some OC's - Freeform, Underage Sex, Violence, sex without condoms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-11-25
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:22:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 59,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27125158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FistfulofDollars/pseuds/FistfulofDollars
Summary: If you haven't read the previous two works in this series I'd recommend it before reading this one. It's basically just the seasons of Shameless from Mickey's point of view.
Relationships: Ian Gallagher/Mickey Milkovich
Series: Shameless: The Mickey Milkovich Story [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1918894
Comments: 27
Kudos: 80





	1. Thought you were in Juvie

**Author's Note:**

> Here is the start of season 3! This season is, in my opinion at least, the saddest one. I'll put a warning before the events of 3x6 and it will probably be it's own separate chapter you can skip it if you want. I wouldn't blame you at all. I'll try to keep a good balance between fluff and seriousness throughout the season, and I'll definitely write season 4 no matter what because I don't want to end where this one does.  
> Is this a terrible introduction? Sorry. I do hope that you enjoy of course, and I really appreciate all the people who have commented saying how much they relate to Mickey. I feel that way too, and my hope with writing this is to get a deeper understanding of his character and share it with other people who want that too!   
> Thanks again for reading! :)

Season 3; Chapter 1:

It starts with a lock-down. All the inmates, himself included, are lined up against the wall while corrections officers pace around. A man with grey hair, a blue suit, and an important looking air to his step walks around and glances into cells seemingly at random. 

It’s all anyone can talk about for days after. 

Then the rumors start. Among the guards and trustees, and finally around the cell block where Mickey hears them: large-scale releases expected because of overcrowding. 

Mickey doesn’t pay any attention to the rumors. Gets pissed, in fact, when anyone mentions them near him. He doesn’t want to think about getting out, knows what a trap that can be, and has nothing - no one - to picture getting out for. It’s ironic, but he’s made it longer without any outbursts this time than he managed to before, when he had actually been trying to behave. 

So when he and nine other guys are pulled out of the block, lined up in the hallway, and marched into the warden’s office one by one, Mickey doesn’t participate in the excited chatter along with the other inmates. 

It turns out the silver fox with the important-looking walk  _ is _ the warden. He doesn’t offer to shake Mickey’s hand, but he does gesture to a seat in front of his desk before pulling out a manila folder with Mickey’s full name printed along the side. Mickey knows all about files like that. He’s seen them before in the hands of public defenders, prosecutors, judges, CPS workers. The people that hold those files always sit on the other side of things - desks, podiums, tables, it doesn’t matter as long as it’s not the same side as him - and read through them instead of talking to him and think they know him. 

“I think I’ve got a pretty good handle on you, Mr. Milkovich." The warden says, then closes Mickey’s file and puts it back on the desk. “No reprimands from your current stay?”

“Yeah.” Mickey answers even though the question feels patronizing.

“Well, I can’t get into specifics, but I’d say, given your behavior and the nature of your crime - It was non-violent, yes?”

His original one, petty theft, had been, and when he got the full year for violating his probation, the cop he hit never went through the trouble of filing charges. 

“Why not?” Mickey asks instead of answering. He turns away from the window he’s been looking out. The blinds are open and they’re up high enough, he can just see over the tops of the surrounding buildings.

“Excuse me.”

“Why can’t you get into specifics?” 

The warden frowns.

“It’s a figure of speech,” he says. “But, you might be happy to hear we’re granting you an early release. I can’t... It will probably be a few days before everything is processed, but you should be out of here by the end of the week.”

He grabs a large, official-looking stamp from the corner of his desk and holds it just above Mickey’s file for a moment, like he’s daring him to ask, ‘why not?’ again. Then it comes down with a clack and stamps EARLY RELEASE across the front of the folder in red letters. 

It only takes two days before Mickey’s breathing fresh air as a free man again. Mentally it’s a shock, and one he hasn’t prepared himself for. He didn’t tell anyone he was getting out, has barely had time to process it himself, but he’s cashed out his commissary and has forty-four dollars in his pocket to use however he chooses. Now that he’s free, a vague idea of what he plans to do with the rest of the summer has formed in the back of his mind, but mostly he just feels un-tethered. 

For almost a year, everything he’s done - everyone he’s talked to - has been inside the building behind him. Now he has no direction, no agenda, no one to ask. 

As for what he wants, he no longer has any answer to that. 

After so much time indoors, it seems like being outside would be a relief, but it has the opposite kind of effect. Instead of refreshing, the open sky above him feels more like a threat, and he’s happy to get on the L - taking the furthest car back because there’s less people waiting down there - and have the roof right above him as the train jolts along. At first he thinks he’ll just get off at his stop and go back home, but when the time comes to disembark he hesitates and winds up missing it. 

The train continues, passengers get off and on, and no one looks twice at him. He ends up taking it all the way east again, and gets off at the loop thinking about maybe going to the water. The buildings here reach up to what feels like hundreds of stories and they loom over the streets in a way that keeps the open air from being too overwhelming, and which Mickey finds vaguely comforting: like a roof with no walls, or walls with no roof. Either way he abandons his plans to see the lakefront and walks through the city instead. 

By the time he’s in front of the chain movie theater, whose large billboard advertises six or seven movies he’s never had the chance to hear about, his feet are sore from walking in shoes he’s no longer used to, and he’s ready to get off the crowded sidewalks. 

He buys a matinee ticket to a movie called The Purge and gets a small popcorn for himself too because it’s his damn money and there’s no one here to tell him not to. The last, and only other time, he was in a movie theater he had sneaked in with Ian and they had missed the first half of the movie, but it didn’t matter because he spent the entire half they did see staring in awe at the size of it while Ian watched him watching his first movie on an actual ‘big-screen’. 

Nothing feels that marvelous this time around; the popcorn’s pretty good though. 

He takes a spot towards the back, away from the few other people in the theater this time of day, but just after the previews for other upcoming movies he’ll probably never see come on, another couple comes in and sits just a few seats away from him in the same row. He ignores their dirty looks and whispers when he stands up to move further away, but can’t stop himself from noticing them at least. 

Who does that anyways? There’s plenty of other places to sit.

As soon as the movie starts though, it takes all of his attention. It’s fiction, obviously, but the whole idea of having a day - a day to do whatever you wanted, no consequences - is so incredible he kind of can’t believe it’s not actually a thing. What really strikes him is the  _ possibilities _ . Not for random murder, anyone with an unregistered gun could go to the shanty town and do that if they’re so inclined, but the fact that it would only take one day: one day, one good score with no arrests, and his whole life could change. He’d go to one of those museums, or banks, he passed on the way to the theater, and, once he had the shit, the next day he’d sell it right back to those fuckers. Full price, no fences. Then…

Then what? Then, he’d be one of the fuckers with a ten thousand dollar security system trying to protect shit he didn’t need from people who just wanted the chance to make it to tomorrow. That’s life though, and it would be nice, for once, not to be the one on the outside looking in. 

He sits through all the credits, his popcorn forgotten on the seat next to him, but eventually the lights come on and he knows it’s time to leave. There’s nothing for it, he’s got nowhere else to be; it’s time to go home. 

*-*-*

The front door to the house is unlocked like always, and when he walks inside Tony looks up from the couch, sees him, and says, “Mickey!” the way an excited sports fan might yell, ‘goal!’. 

Despite his early release, he’s technically served the full term for his original crime, stealing that Snickers bar all those years ago, and there’s no probation skank to answer to this time. Just him and his freedom, a beer, and the joint Tony offers him. After eight months of nothing but the very occasionally smuggled weed, he takes a few drags and ten minutes later thinks he could sit on this couch all day just watching his brother play video games on the new flat-screen. 

Tony talks for a while but doesn’t ask Mickey anything about Juvie or why he’s back already. He tells Mickey that Mandy’s dating Lip Gallagher now, that Terry and Iggy have some big job coming up, and that there’s a gunshow downtown soon he’s excited about. It’s comfortable, listening to him talk about nothing, and even though the house is different this time - the furniture rearranged to accommodate the new TV - it all still feels familiar enough. At the very least, he more or less still feels like he belongs here. 

When Tony leaves for work laying asphalt with their uncle, Mickey goes to his room, where nothing has been disturbed, but still can’t relax. He smokes more of Tony’s weed, lifts weights, tries to sleep but can’t. 

It’s kind of horrible to admit - after months of ruminating on how much he hated him - but now that seeing Ian again is an actual possibility, thoughts of the redhead start seeping into his brain in a way they haven’t since he went inside. It’s stupid and he knows it. The time has come to move on, get over it - whatever  _ it _ was that they were doing - and get his life back on track the way it used to be. He’s not gay; he belongs here, in the Yards, with his family. Maybe sex with Ian is amazing, and maybe he slept with other guys in prison. But who doesn’t? If Mickey wants to get laid, there’s plenty of places in his own neighborhood he can. 

He tries to count his reps with barbells, but loses track when he starts wondering if Ian would still have him, just once so he can be done with it and put it out of his mind, but there are no one-night stands with Ian. The strings attached to that relationship pull him too much, in too many different ways. 

He needs to get out of the house. Needs to be on the move so he doesn't have to listen to himself think. One more beer, an old hoodie he’s cut the sleeves off to accommodate the warm weather, and it’s just past four in the afternoon when he leaves the house again. It doesn’t seem like that long ago the neighborhood had felt so large. When he and Ian used to look for places to hide together the possibilities had seemed endless, but walking down the streets alone today, the opposite feels true. He has nothing to do, no one to do it with, and what’s the point of all these special places if he’s just going to sit there alone. 

He walks past the Kash-and-Grab and sees that the lights are on, the open sign facing out. He can’t tell who’s behind the counter from where he’s standing - maybe Ian quit or maybe Linda’s popped that kid out and is running the store herself now - but he crosses to the other side of the street and walks by quickly just in case.

He spends a few hours like that, walking around because he can now and because it’s comforting to see all the familiar places again. The sun is only just beginning its long descent into night as he walks back from a grocery store where he’s spent the rest of his commissary money on cigarettes and beer. His beard, too much of a pain to shave in Juvie, is now starting to get itchy as the temperature rises and he thinks it’ll have to go. He also needs to collect on debts now that he’s out so he’ll have some spending money if he needs it. 

_ That’s me _ ,  _ a real busy guy. _ Mickey thinks, enjoying the bitterness of his own thoughts.

On the sidewalk in front of him, someone’s opening their front gate and carrying a garbage bag full of laundry inside. He starts to step off the curb to get around, but when she looks up, he realizes he recognizes her. 

“Mickey?” She says first.

“Hey Angie.”

He knows her from school. She’s probably still in the same class in high school he would have been, but he mostly remembers her from grade school. Back when he was too young to really think about ditching or leaving campus during lunch, and his lack of friends had caused him more trouble than it would later. He and Angie would sit at the same otherwise empty table at lunch because the kids teased Mickey for his ratty clothes and the smell that tends to accompany a young kid whose parents don’t give a shit about hygiene. Angie received similar treatment for her weight and quiet personality. Mickey seems to remember she used to carry around a toy horse too that didn’t do her any favors. They’d eat in the companionable silence of fellow outcasts having little more in common than that. 

“I heard you were in Juvie.” She says, dropping the trash bag on the cement walkway of the house and coming back through the fence to talk to him on the sidewalk. 

“Yeah. Got out this morning.”

“Oh. How was...that?” She seems to realize the question is awkward halfway through, but has never been anything but nice to him, so he’s not going to give her shit about it.

“Glad to be out, I guess.”

“Oh, yeah. Definitely.” 

There’s a moment of silence that would be a perfect place to end the conversation, but neither of them do. After the aimless hours he’s spent walking alone, and nothing but an empty house waiting for him, Mickey finds he wants to keep talking to her and searches around for something to say. 

“How’s um…” He remembers she has a pet, but can’t remember it’s name. “Your rat?”

She looks at him with a kind of fond amusement. 

“My hamster? He died a few years ago.”

“Oh.”

Another pause, but this time he can’t think of anything to say. 

“Are you going to a party?” She asks, pointing at the case of beer he’s got under his arm. 

“Nah, it’s just for me.” 

That same look of amusement turns her features into something more pleasant than a girl like Mandy could ever manage with makeup, and he has a brief but very clear flashback to their days in the cafeteria. 

“You wanna come in? I have some weed we could smoke.”

“Sure.” Compared to drinking alone in his room, it doesn’t sound too bad. 

They end up on her bed, almost twice as big as Mickey’s and covered in soft blankets and even softer pillows, and she pulls out her laptop to stream some sitcom while Mickey loads the bong. They smoke and drink beer, and she lets him smoke his cigarettes as long as he blows it out the window. He’s never seen the show before, but there’s a laugh track so he can react to it if he wants without having to pay attention. 

If only the rest of life was like that.

Like before, they still don’t have much in common, but they manage to pass an hour together easily enough. Maybe Mickey’s just high, but by the time the credits roll on the second episode, he thinks he’s starting to like the show. 

On her dresser, in the corner of the room, is the plastic horse she used to bring to school. 

“You wanna have sex?” She asks after Mickey finishes his second beer. She’s still looking at the laptop when she asks, but after a few seconds of him not replying, she turns to look at his face instead.

“I don’t have a condom.” He says, thinking about Ian again after having managed so many hours without.

“Oh,” She shrugs, “I don’t mind.”

He feels comfortable, relaxed; sex with Angie might actually be what he’s been looking for all along. 

“Okay.”

She closes the laptop and moves it to her nightstand. Then pulls the heavy blinds over the window and the room becomes much darker. When they’re nothing but outlines in the dark, she pulls off her clothes and lifts herself back onto the bed while Mickey wiggles out of his own pants. 

Nothing they do ends up tempering that desire inside him, but it seems to make Angie happy, and he doesn’t embarrass himself like he had with that Russian woman. He finishes. Pulls out and has to jerk himself over the edge for maybe longer than typical, but Angie doesn’t mention it. 

He smokes by the window while she gets dressed.

“Do you want another hit?” She holds out the bong to him.

“Nah. I think I’m gonna head out.”

“Okay.” She hits it herself and goes back to watching her show while he grabs the rest of his beer. 

She doesn’t walk him to the door, but she does give him a little wave when he leaves the room, which he returns. 

*-*-*

_ You’re nothing but a warm mouth to me _

Was that the last thing he said to Ian? Mickey can’t remember, but he thinks it might have been, or very close to.

He’s laying on his bed now, the rest of his beer gone, Mandy still hasn’t come home. His brothers make noise in the living room occasionally though. 

_ Nothing but a warm mouth _

Had he ever told such a lie before?

There are millions of warm mouths in the city, and Mickey’s ruined his chances with the only one he really wants. 

What was the last thing Ian had said to him?

But he can’t remember. What he does remember is the way Ian had written him off; the way he decided, after every chance Mickey took, every line he had crossed, that he was no longer worth his time. 

He wants his friend back, and he wants to do those things they used to do together, again. What he doesn’t want is all the other stuff: the hiding, Ian’s complaining about the hiding, the unexpected discoveries that still make him feel sick to his stomach if he thinks about it too much. They’ve been apart for so long, all these months, and if he goes back now, he’ll be admitting that he needs Ian more than Ian needs him. If he doesn’t go back, he’ll just have to live with this feeling inside himself that something is missing. A craving that all the Angie’s - and cellmates - in the world can’t satisfy. He’s feeling it now, like an itch inside him. 

At least he finally has the privacy to jack off without feeling some other guy’s eyes on him. 

He turns the bedroom light off, but doesn’t bother getting under the sheets as he pulls his pants down. The sun has finally set, the room is cooling off after the heat of the day, and he lays on his back in the dark letting his hands run under his shirt, down his hips, and across the tops of his thighs. Ian used to touch him like this, whenever Mickey would let him. Touch his tattoos and scars like there’s something compelling about the things that make Mickey unique. 

Instead of feeling his scars, which carry mostly negative emotions, Mickey lets his hands dip down between his legs. His fingers tease the sensitive spot behind his balls, go up to his dick, and stroke it lazily.

If he can’t get what he needs from someone else, he can give it to himself. It worked just fine in his early teen years, after all. Before Ian had spoiled him.

There’s still lube in the nightstand and he takes it out, likes the way his body responds just to the sound of the top popping off and the feeling of it on his fingers. It takes him a few tries to find a good position to reach between his legs comfortably, and eventually he settles with half-sitting, leaning his back against the wall and letting one of his legs hang off the bed. 

In Juvie, jacking off was a quick, quiet thing, and having the privacy now to really indulge himself is nice. By the time he gets his hand back to his dick, it’s hard and ready for what they’re about to do. His hand with the lube on it goes between his spread legs and he slips one finger inside himself. It makes him pull a deep breath in, more from the novelty of doing this to himself than the actual feeling of it. When he scoots his legs a little further apart and slides another finger in, his eyes fall closed.

With no one else in the room to pay attention to, Mickey’s completely focused on what he wants. When it’s Ian doing this, he’d just feel flashes of intense pleasure. Now he can search for those sensations and rub the same spot over and over, or spread his fingers and pull them out at just the right speed to make his stomach clench and his breath come out in short huffs. 

The hand on his dick has barely moved; it’s grip is mostly just there for comfort as he explores himself. The longer he goes, the more he wants, and by the time he’s added a third finger, the leg hanging off the bed is trembling. 

Alone, there’s no reason to feel embarrassed about the faces he’s making. 

Still, there’s something missing. Not just the company of having someone else with him while he gets off, but the feeling of Ian’s cock his fingers just can’t replicate, the overwhelming sensation of it pulling in and out that Mickey will never be flexible enough to manage like this. As far as settling goes though, this might be the best he’s ever felt without actually getting what he wants. 

He tries to enjoy it for as long as he can, and continues to ignore his dick until he’s right on the edge. Eventually he can’t anymore, and he gives it a few tight strokes and comes all over his stomach with a groan he does nothing to suppress. 

He takes his fingers out of his ass immediately, feeling embarrassed with himself. 

In the dark, he sits with his back against the wall, his eyes closed, and just breathes. It’s not until he’s washing his hands in the bathroom that he thinks about Ian again. Not that Ian usually sticks around for this long after they finish.

_ And whose fault is that?  _ He asks himself, but is no longer sure of the answer. 

*-*-*

He’s in the kitchen the next day eating a strawberry poptart straight out of the bag when Mandy finally comes home. She slips in through the back door, and when she sees him - mouth full, crumbs on his freshly shaved chin - she stops walking mid-step. 

He has to finish chewing before he can say anything.

“Hey.” He manages, once he finally swallows. 

“Holy shit. Did you break out?”

“Yeah. If the cops come by, tell ‘em I was never here.”

She gets a very Mandy look on her face - part anger, part righteous indignation - and before she can lose her shit and start lecturing him on something as stupid as breaking out of prison, he tosses the empty poptart wrapper on the counter and says: 

“Relax. They just let me out early for overcrowding.”

“Seriously?”

“Why, you like having me gone?”

“No, I’m just surprised is all.” She smiles all the sudden, and the way it changes her face makes Mickey feel a warm rush of brotherly love towards her. “I missed you,” she says, and crosses the kitchen to pull him into a tight hug.

Terry’s in his room sleeping - his loud, chainsaw snoring can be heard faintly even in the kitchen - and there’s no one else home so they chat for a while. She confirms that she’s dating the older Gallagher brother now, and goes off on a crazy tangent about how she’s going to apply to colleges for him without his knowledge. 

“Because it’s just such a waste of his potential, you know?”

“Mands, don’t do that.”

“What, why not?”

“Just don’t, okay.” He tries to picture a good outcome for the scenario, and can’t.

“Whatever. You don’t know anything about guys - Oh, hey,” she cuts herself off mid-thought. “Did you tell Ian you’re out? He’s been asking about you.”

“Who?” Mickey asks, but he sounds too annoyed to be believable. 

“Don’t be such a shit. I think he really looks up to you.”

“The fuck do I care what that…” At the very last second, he finds he can’t call Ian a faggot, even though he had meant it as a general insult, and not a fact. Mandy looks at him funny when he trails off, but either can’t quite figure out what he was going to say or doesn’t want to give anything away herself by mentioning it. 

“Look,” She says instead, glossing over the awkward moment. “He’s at school today doing his army stuff. You should go see him. I don’t know what went down between you two, but I’m sick of being in the middle of it.”

Whatever goodwill they had towards each other when she first came in has disappeared, and now they’re just two slightly annoyed siblings again.

“Yeah, whatever.”

“And don’t piss him off either.” She calls over her shoulder as she heads to her room, “He could probably kick  _ your  _ ass now.”

*-*-*

He needs to go by the high school anyway, to hunt down the kids that owe him money, and he’s not convinced he’s even going to look for Ian until he gets there. There’s some students playing soccer and running along the track, and a few over by the opening to the locker rooms in full camo. He looks, but none of them are Ian. He shouldn’t care, but now that he’s started looking he might as well find him.

He doesn’t have to think too hard to know where to check next.

Below the bleachers, over and under the familiar steel supports, and he can already hear the sounds of other people satisfying that same desire that had been driving him crazy last night.

This time one of them is Ian. 

“Lookie what we got here.” He calls out when he’s close enough. It’s kind of a rush being the one doing the discovering this time, like being in a position of power, and he enjoys it all the way up until he really gets a good look at Ian, for the first time since he went inside. Then the sight of Gallagher fucking someone else - right now, in front of him - brings something else to the surface. Something that feels very much like jealousy, but he could probably write it off as just general horniness, or maybe left over annoyance from his and Ian’s last encounter, or any number of things that have nothing to do with the fact that they used to bang here, just like that. 

Now he’s getting the exact same expression of surprise Mandy had this morning from Gallagher, and it’s making it very difficult to reconcile the feeling that no one gave a shit he was gone with their more-or-less positive reactions to his returning. Seeing that look again, this time on Ian’s face, does more frustrating things to his current mood, and to help expel some of his anger, Mickey lands a kick right in the other kid’s nuts because he’s not protecting them. Then he continues kicking him because he needs to fuck off so Ian and Mickey can be alone; because it’s a good lesson in what happens to queers who bottom; because this is his and Ian’s spot and apparently that doesn’t mean anything to anyone but Mickey. 

The kid takes the hint and leaves. Just another reminder that there isn’t anything special about what he and Ian do together, and there never was. 

Special or not, if Ian’s giving out free fucks today Mickey will take one, and then get back to what he was doing before. It’s a nice thought: Ian fucks Mickey, Mickey goes back to collecting his drug money, and he absolutely doesn’t have to obsess about the way it feels having Ian behind him, nudging his nose against his hair while they both pull their pants down. 

“I thought you’d never speak to me again.” Ian says against the back of his neck.

“Stop talking, shut the fuck up, and fuck me Gallagher.”

For some reason, this makes Ian laugh.

“Okay. Alright.” He says and pulls off his shirt even though it’s clinging to his stomach tightly and won’t get in the way. “Can’t you at least tell me how you’re out so early?”

“Ask Mandy.”

“...okay.”

For a second it seems like that’s enough and they’re done talking now, but even with his pants hanging open, and Mickey’s down around his waist, Ian hesitates.

“You sure you want to do it this way?”

“Fucking Christ, Ian. No, I want you to lift me up in your pansy-ass arms and fuck me like that.”

“Alright, alright. Just asking.”

From inside his back pocket, Ian pulls out the tiniest bottle of lube imaginable and when he catches Mickey staring, smiles. 

“It’s travel sized.”

“Fucking fantastic.”

“Are you sure you're okay, Mick?”

“Fine. Thanks for asking.” He says in a tone that doesn’t sound very thankful.

He didn’t come here to chat, and this time when he turns around, Ian doesn’t attempt to get him to talk again.

Up until the moment Ian’s got two fingers in his ass, there’s a part of Mickey that hopes it won’t feel as good as he remembers, that he’s been building up what they do together in his mind simply because he couldn’t have it anymore. If only that was the case, if only he could replicate this feeling in any other way that didn’t involve Ian, then maybe his whole life would end up on a very different path. It’s not the case, though. This isn’t fingering himself. It’s not sex with Angie. It’s Ian taking deep breaths right next to his ear, kicking at his shoes until Mickey’s legs are in just the right position. It’s him, letting Ian do pretty much whatever the hell he wants, because there’s nothing else in the world that could make him feel like this.

When Ian pulls his fingers out, Mickey lets out a groan against his forearm where his head is resting. Other than that he stays quiet until once again he can feel Ian behind him, hesitating.

“The fuck is wrong with you today, Gallagher?”

“Me!? Can’t you at least try to relax.”

Maybe Ian’s right, and it is him that’s too tense. It’s just them under here, and anything threatening he’s worried about has been left behind in the prison yards, but his body has quite caught up to that yet. He can feel it in his arms and hands where he’s holding the steel beams, and his legs which have already started shifting back together after the last time Ian nudged them apart. He’s as relaxed as he ever is these days, but in the interest of just doing this already before some unwitting person comes down here and discovers them, Mickey takes a few deep breaths, smells the fresh scent grass and sod from the field, and wills his hands to loosen on the metal so his knuckles aren’t quite so white. 

Some of the tension gone from his body, he says, “Okay, I’m ready.” and Ian must agree because he comes up closer behind Mickey until they’re almost touching, puts one hand on his hips, and uses the other one to guide his dick. 

In some ways, it’s like their first time all over again. Ian goes incredibly slow to start, and every inch further he pushes inside makes Mickey grind his teeth just trying to keep quiet. There’s no telling what kind of sounds he’d make right now if he let himself, and even less what Ian would make of them. 

Fucking someone is just such a different feeling from  _ being _ fucked, it almost seems crazy that they happen at the same time. For all his misgiving about being with Ian, this really is top-tier sexual fulfillment; he could be in the worst mood imaginable, and if Ian would just do this to him - exactly like this, slow and persistent, stretching him out, filling him up - he’d get over it, whatever the problem was. There’s no holding on to anything negative when he’s getting exactly what he wants, from exactly who he wants it from. Somehow adding to the pleasure of it, at least for him, is that what they’re doing is considered by so many people to be morally objectionable, or an obscene novelty reserved for the adventurous. The things Ian is doing to him right now are so improper, some people wouldn’t even associate with him if they knew. Not that they could ever  _ know _ ; not unless they tried it for themselves. 

What he and Ian do might not be special or unique to them, but Mickey knows that most people won’t ever get to feel what he’s feeling - won’t even get a chance to find out if they would enjoy it the way he does - and just knowing that somehow makes him want it all even more. Let those other fuckers die, old and gray, never knowing one second of the pleasure he’s feeling right now. Their loss. As far as Mickey’s concerned, he and Ian have discovered something so indecent, just doing it is like being free. Free from the expectations of others, free from anyone else's idea of who they should be. 

It’s just the two of them now, so involved in what they’re doing to each other - _ together _ \- that when Mickey can’t stand it anymore and does finally let out a quiet moan, Ian nods against his shoulder blades in agreement that  _ yes, god, that does feel good. _

It’s not an easy angle, having Ian hold him so tight, he can’t really bend over. Most of his weight is being supported by his grip on the metal beams and Ian’s arm wrapped tightly around his waist. As for his feet, only the tips of his toes are on the ground. Mickey’s short, and he’s not weightless, and they won’t be able to keep this position up forever. Already he can feel sweat making his hands slip along the bar. Ian’s either oblivious to the fact Mickey can’t stand on his tip-toes this long, or doesn’t care. Every time Mickey tries to bend over further, to put himself at the right height and angle without sacrificing his feet, Ian grabs him tighter around the chest, pulls him closer. Like he’d rather be able to hold Mickey than fuck him, and at this point it’s more like Ian’s hugging him from behind, dick still buried in his ass, than actually fucking him. 

Mickey’s going to tell him to cut it the fuck out and just fuck him already, as soon as he’s confident in his own ability to make actual words come out of his mouth instead of just involuntary, appreciative noises that are only encouraging Ian. 

In the end, it’s too much to ask: to form actual sentences when Ian’s all the way inside him like this, making what he did to himself last night seem like a joke. Eventually he just has to let his feet fall flat against the ground, and leave Ian to realize he’s either going to have to hold them both up or loosen his grip so Mickey can just bend over already. He does. Not without a sigh, but once Mickey’s leaning further forward, Ian pulls out slowly, pushes back in, and does it over again, testing out the new angle until Mickey finally remembers how to make words again. Except the only ones coming to mind are ‘fuck yes’ and ‘don’t stop’ and he says them over and over again while his hand goes to work on his own dick, and somewhere in the distance the sharp sound of a sport whistle rings out signalling the end, or beginning, of a play.

Even having an orgasm while getting fucked isn’t at all like masturbating; it’s not the feeling of his hand that’s getting him there, he doesn’t get to set the pace. Instead it’s some combination of the stretching, tugging, sensation of Ian thrusting into him and the incredible pressure of his dick inside Mickey that really does it, and even though he’s had a thousand orgasms, few of them have built up inside him like this. Beyond his control, and so overwhelming he’s left utterly helpless while it’s happening, can only pray that Ian won’t stop what he’s doing until it’s done. He prays and he begs, just a little, just one word, ‘please’, and he might as well have saved his breath because Ian has no intention of stopping. When he does finally come, it’s intense enough to make his toes curl in his sneakers and his arm tremble while it continues to hold his weight on the beam, and still Ian doesn’t stop.. 

Before Mickey has to tell him to slow down, take a break, relax already, or anything else equally mood-killing, Ian pulls out. All at once and so suddenly, it makes Mickey’s dick twitch, even though it’s pretty much soft now, like an after shock of the orgasm he just had. For whatever reason, Ian chooses to finish on the ground at their feet too, instead of inside him. 

When Mickey turns around, pants still down around his knees, he catches a glimpse of Ian in perfect form: panting, dick half-hard, one of his hands wrapped around it loosely and the other in his hair, an expression on his face that tells Mickey it was equally amazing for both of them. He turns away before his glance can become a stare.  _ That’s _ exactly the Ian Gallagher who always gets Mickey in trouble, and it’s exactly the kind of thing he has to keep himself away from if he ever wants to get out of this life alive. 

He continues to look anywhere else while they dress in silence, and when they’re done, he lights up a cigarette while Ian ignores any unstated rules about personal space, hangs over him, and watches. 

“Missed you,” Mickey says. Teasing, but with a purpose. He wants to gauge Ian’s reaction, want’s to figure out where Gallagher thinks they stand without doing something stupid like just coming out and asking. He also wants to make his own intentions about them hooking up, without the added stress of hanging out, clear without having to actually say it in so many words. 

“You did?”

“Yeah, man. Had to do all the fucking in Juvie. Otherwise I’d end up someone's bitch, right? Nice to switch back.”

Ian makes no mention of them getting back together, of the months they haven’t spoken, and maybe Mickey shouldn’t have worried at all about keeping him at a distance, maybe this time they’ve both realized it’s for the best.

He seems more interested in school and ROTC than he is in what Mickey’s doing, and, for his own part, Mickey’s got his own shit to worry about. His own work to do, collecting old debts, whether or not Ian approves which he probably doesn’t, but doesn’t say so one way or the other. Not that Mickey gives him much of a chance. He leaves the cigarette with Ian and stands up to go, figuring they’ve both got places to be, but as he’s walking away Ian calls out to him like he was expecting their conversation to keep going:

“Wait, that’s it? What if I want to see you again?”

_ Not your problem, Ian. We’re not doing that again. _

Instead of answering, Mickey flips him off as he walks away.

*-*-*

Only one of the kids he’s looking for is at the school today. They’re studying with a group in what passes for the school’s chemistry lab and pay up immediately to avoid a scene. Another, he tracks down at her home where the door is answered by a grumpy woman with a baby on her hip and a spit up stain on her oversized, novelty tee: I Got Wet at Grand Rapids.

He tells her he’s there to pick up the summer reading list from Jenny, and she leads him back through the house, past the kitchen where a highchair stands by the counter, it’s plastic tray covered in cheerios, and to a closed door decorated with multi-colored construction paper flowers and bees. He expects the woman to knock, and startles when she screams suddenly instead.

“Jenny! Some kid from school is here to pick up homework!” Mickey looks at the baby she’s holding, but it doesn’t seem too disturbed by the sudden noise.

A few seconds later the door opens and Jenny appears in her pajamas, her hair wrapped up on the top of her head with a towel. When she sees it’s him, her face does a speed-run from surprise to fear and finally settles on something neutral. 

“Okay. Thanks, mom.”

The woman walks away, and when she leaves Mickey crowds Jenny back so he can go into her room and close the door behind him. 

“What do you want, Mickey?”

“You know what I want.” He looks around the room, at her pastel furniture and the posters of leading men from movies and bands hanging on the walls, while she decides whether or not to just pay up. 

“I don’t have any money.” She says like he’s stupid for asking, like he’s stupid enough to believe her.

“Cool. I’ll take this then.”

He reaches out for the iPhone sitting on the nightstand charging and she grabs at his wrist to stop him. When she touches him, he twists his arm out of her grasp and takes both her wrists in his hands instead. He holds them like that, tightly, at eye level while she struggles and the towel comes untwisted, falling to the floor and letting her damp hair hang down. 

“I’ll scream.” She says, and she might, but he still doesn’t let her go. 

“Go ahead. I’d love to tell your bitch mom about those lines you did in the bathroom.”

They’re the same age, but the way she pouts when she realizes she’s either going to have to pay up or explain to her mother why there’s a drug dealer in the house makes her look ten years younger, and petulant. 

“I told you I don’t have it.”

“Bullshit.” She’s still tugging at his grip, and it’s going to leave bruises on her wrists if she doesn’t stop. “A hundred bucks for the two dimes, and if you don’t stop fucking around, I’ll charge you another hundred for wasting my fucking time.” 

“I’ll report you to the cops.” She says, and it makes Mickey smile. It wouldn’t be worth it to go to prison, but it would be pretty satisfying to see her try that huffy look out on the police after he explained the situation. 

“Then I’ll tell them all about how you and your dumb-cunt friends love to buy coke from me and smoke weed in the school bathrooms. Maybe we can ride the bus to prison together. I heard the lady’s side isn’t half as bad.”

She stops trying to pull away and looks him in the eyes until she sees enough to convince herself he’s serious. 

“What do you want, Mickey?”

“My money you dumb-”

“No, I mean what do you want instead of the money?” She’s looking at him now the same way Ian does when he decides it’ll be easier to convince Mickey to fuck than to argue with him.

His grip tightens until she lets out a pained ‘ow!’ because he’s starting to get pissed. He doesn’t really want to hurt her, but he’s not a hundred percent sure he’ll be able to stop himself until he actually lets go. 

“Not if you were the last bitch on Earth. A hundred bucks, or I take the phone. Your choice.”

She cradles her wrists like he’s broken them, and he has a sudden flashback to that kid, the plastic fork, and his first time in Juvie. 

“You’re a piece of shit.” She spits out, but goes to her dresser and opens one of the top drawers. From under her socks and panties she pulls out a small purse with a wrist strap covered in sequins. By the time she takes out the money she owes him from it, there’s nothing but a lone five dollar bill left.

“Your family’s as fucked up as everyone says, and you’re the worst one.” She says while he counts the bills out for himself. 

_ If you believe that, you don’t know my family _ . 

The money’s all there, and he sees himself out, but her words stay with him on the walk home. 

Because maybe she’s right, and he is just a thug. Every hundred dollars he earns from now on will have to be wrestled from someone else’s pocket. It’s hardly a fair assessment. He went to the original deal, spent his own money, brought the coke back, and sold it to Jenny for a fair price. On credit even. But still, she had looked so sure when she said it. 

_ The worst one _

It isn’t true. It isn’t -

Mickey’s opening the front gate to the house when he looks up and sees Terry standing alone on the porch drinking a forty. It cuts his thoughts off abruptly and his heart gives a few hard thuds in his chest in surprise.

He hasn’t consciously been avoiding Terry. Frank, whether because of Ian’s involvement or his own failing memory, hasn’t said anything about what he saw, that Mickey’s heard about at least. There’s no reason he and Terry’s relationship shouldn’t be in the same strange stalemate it was eight months ago. 

He has to walk up the stairs, so he does. 

If Terry did say anything to him it probably would have made him annoyed or wary, no matter what the comment was, but when his father stays completely silent while he walks past, Mickey’s hit instead by a wave of inadequacy he’s not prepared for. 

So what if Terry doesn’t want anything to do with him? He’s probably just drunk.

Even if he isn’t, it’s been months since Mickey’s been around. Terry probably just needs time to get used to him again, to trust him. It’s happened before, after bad benders - the kind that leave all the kids with bruises - and afterwards Terry shows his remorse by being extra aloof. Unwilling to hear anything about it, he drives everyone to silence for days out of fear of saying the wrong thing. 

He just needs time, and for now all Mickey can do is make more of an effort around the house. So he spends the rest of the day with Tony on the couch, who talks about his work and jobs he’s planning on doing with Terry, plays a few rounds of poker with him and Iggy using bullets as chips, and takes the car to get them all a bucket of chicken with his own money when dinner time comes around. All night, Terry comes and goes as he pleases. He makes plans for gun runs and shakedowns, but doesn’t invite his youngest son to any of them. 

By the time he slinks off to bed, he’s more emotionally, than physically, tired. 

Mandy doesn’t come home at all; Mickey’s starting to realize she might not really live here anymore.

*-*-*


	2. R&R: Redemption & Rehabilitation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mickey continues to adjust to life outside of Juvie. Ian shows off some of the stuff he's done while Mickey was inside.

Season 3; Chapter 2:

The next morning, although it’s just on the cusp of noon when he finally rolls out of bed, Terry mumbles a groggy hello to him from the couch. It looks like he spent the better part of the night there. 

There’s still one cold drumstick in the bucket on the kitchen table, and Mickey eats it quietly in the living room while his father methodically opens, activates, and writes labels on several fresh burner phones he has laid out on the coffee table in front of him.  Terry doesn’t say anything else, but that’s alright. Mickey’s got plenty of time to work his way back into his father’s good graces. Even if it means spending all summer doing bitch work like he had last year. This summer, he’s got nothing but time. 

His schedule today, for instance, has only one thing on it: to track down the remaining two people that owe him money and collect.

He walks to school even though it’s hotter today than it was yesterday, and stops under the bleachers because if Ian’s there -  _ with someone -  _ he wouldn’t mind a repeat of last time, but it’s empty and quiet. Inside the school, it’s cooler at least. 

He peeks into the classrooms through the skinny rectangular windows as he walks by, but most of them are empty, and asks the few students he passes. The majority of them have no idea who he’s talking about, a few of them agree that one of the boys left school - something about his father’s job transferring - which leaves Mickey with just one kid left to look for. 

Sanchez. He comes from the courtyard through the double doors and sees him at his locker. The guy only owes him fifty bucks, but still acts like the victim now that the time has come to pay up. Like everyone else, Sanchez seems both knowledgeable about Mickey’s sentence in Juvie and alarmed they let him out early. Maybe Mickey shouldn’t be surprised everyone knows how much time he was supposed to serve; it’s just another piece of gossip after all. 

_ Ricky Zimmerman’s father got transferred _

_ Mickey Milkovich got twelve months in Juvie _

Ian Gallagher shows up and fucks up his shakedown like a snitch, leaving Mickey with nothing but a locker full of books and half eaten lunchables.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Didn’t want you to get busted.”

As if Mickey can’t handle the few rent-a-cops who patrol the school. As if he hasn’t spent the last eight months in a concrete clubhouse where the other inhabitants were one poorly-timed laugh away from beating him with a plastic lunch tray. 

Gallagher is pushing into his personal space again and staring at him like he wants to start something, but when Mickey snaps at him, he just says, “Nothing” and backs off.

“I don’t want you to go away again.” Ian tries again after a few seconds of walking in silence. “It sucked not having you around.”

“And whose fault is that?” He says irritably. He can feel his mood fast sliding into dangerous territory, but has never mastered the art of pulling himself back once he’s started to get angry.

“So you  _ are _ still mad?” Ian asks, but Mickey doesn’t respond or look at him even though he’s obviously still trying to make eye contact. “Frank didn’t-”

“Don’t! Say his fucking name to me.”

Mickey’s hands come up fast, but only to push Ian back and get some damn space between them. Their eyes finally meet, but Ian looks away first. For a second, the echo of Mickey’s shout bounces through the empty hallway, then everything falls silent again. 

“How can I make it up to you?” Ian asks, looking up from the floor with a frown. 

_ Is  _ he mad at Ian? Or is he just frustrated in general about school and Juvie and that kid who moved and will now never have to pay up? It’s not a question even Mickey has the answer to. 

“You can blow me.” He says unkindly, and looks Ian up and down like a man might check out a whore he’s deciding whether or not to drop a C-note on. 

It’s demeaning and rude and if that doesn’t send Gallagher packing, he’s not sure what will. 

“Okay.” Ian says without hesitating. 

“What?” 

“Okay, I’ll blow you. Then, we can move on and go back to… just go back.”

Go back? No, they’re not going to go back, but now that Ian’s agreed, a blow job doesn’t sound like a bad idea. Especially after Ian helped Sanchez get away. 

“Alright.” He says, but jerks his arm away when Ian goes to grab it and gets an eye-roll in return as though Mickey’s being childish. Instead of leading him by the arm to it, Ian points at a door with a lock on the handle and no rectangular window: a supply closet.

“Let’s go in there.” 

Without waiting for Mickey to respond, he crouches down in front of the handle and pulls a metal pick out of his wallet. “I’ve gotten a lot better at this.” He says while he fiddles with the lock and Mickey keeps watch. He’s never seen Ian pick a lock before, but if this is what he considers ‘better at it’ then Mickey’s glad he hasn’t. He controls his temper though and stays silent while Ian works and after a minute they both hear the click when he finally gets it. The handle turns easily now, and he follows Ian into the small room where the smell of bleach is so strong it makes him feel cleaner just being in here. On the only section of wall not blocked off by shelves of cleaning supplies, there’s a faded poster of a woman in a swimsuit, its corners holey and torn from the number of times it’s been moved and re-hung.

Ian clicks the lock shut again behind them. 

Instead of sinking straight to his knees, he puts a hand on the back of Mickey’s neck and leans in until his nose is brushing lightly against Mickey’s ear. 

“You’re so tense.” Ian whispers and the feeling of his breath when he speaks sends warmth through Mickey’s body. Having him so close does a lot to counter any tension he may have been feeling, and Mickey has a flashback to the two of them sitting under the overpass, Ian stroking his beard. 

“Don’t.”

“Don’t what?” Ian asks, but the answer is obvious because Mickey’s pushing him away, firmly. His hands on Ian’s shoulders. For a moment they just look at each other, but Ian isn’t going to give up that easy. He pushes back against the pressure on his shoulders until their faces are close again; until they can both hear the sound Mickey’s throat makes when he swallows tensely, nervously. 

Why can’t Ian ever just listen to him?

“If you hate me now, just say it.”

“Fuck off.” Mickey says instead. Ian waits, but he has nothing else to add.

“Then if you don’t fucking hate me,” Now they’re pressed so close together in this small room, Mickey has to turn his head to the side to keep their noses from touching, but it only gives Ian another opportunity to whisper right into his ear. “Stop acting like it, and just forgive me already.” 

“The fuck are you talking about?”

This is it exactly. The very thing he was afraid would happen and now he’s walked right back into it, allowing himself to get persuaded with the promise of getting fucked, of blow jobs in supply closets. Before he answers, Ian’s hands find their way to his hair, and he’s struck again by how different it is, to be touched by someone else, someone that isn’t him, someone he trusts.

After all, it’s only Ian.

“I miss talking to you. I miss…” His head still turned to the side, Mickey feels rather than sees Ian shake his head. “You, Mick. I’m sorry, okay? I’m sorry.”

Even if Mickey could remember with perfect clarity every conversation he’s ever had, he could probably count on just one hand the number of times he’s been sincerely apologized to. Ian doesn’t stop there either. He brings his hands down to Mickey’s stomach, under his shirt, and runs them over his skin like he used to. Mickey breathes, closes his eyes, and lets him. 

He’s been too tense, for too long, to suddenly make his muscles loosen or his hands unclench, but he does let himself get pressed against one of the shelves, lets his legs fall open a little, and, when one of Ian’s knees slides between them to press against his crotch just right, he lets himself huff out a grateful breath meant for the only other person around to hear it.  Before he can get too comfortable, something on the shelf to his left shifts and falls off its perch with a clatter that makes him jump and look around for the source of the noise. It’s just a paintbrush, bristles crusted over with white paint. He looks for a moment before turning back to Ian, only to see he’s looking at him with genuine concern. 

“Jesus, what did they do to you in there?” He asks, and Mickey’s not sure what he’s talking about. Maybe the regimented days, over and over again until the idea of doing something outside that forced order becomes anxiety-inducing itself, or maybe he means the invasive cell searches, the constant conflict of two many young people in such a small space, the noise, the need to hide any signs of weakness. He could be talking about any of that, but the question’s probably rhetorical anyway. 

Ian doesn’t force an answer, but he does continue to lean against him until the pressure is so great, Mickey couldn’t move even if he wanted to. He lets his head fall forward while Ian’s hands run up his arms, across his shoulder blades, and one of them goes back to his hair where it just strokes his head gently. The effect is so calming, Mickey can actually feel his heartbeat slow down. 

Ian doesn’t apologize again, but there’s no apology in the world that could have the same effect as his hands in Mickey’s hair coupled with the way Ian’s lips are brushing against his neck. 

By the time he slowly pulls himself away, Mickey feels so much more relaxed than before, his entire thought process seems to have changed to match the new, slow beating of his heart. For a moment, but as soon as Ian’s arms aren’t holding him anymore, some of the tension returns. This time he can actually feel it, in his shoulders and chest, making his muscles tight like something’s about to happen he might need to react to even though there’s nothing else going on. 

How long has he been walking around like this? But he didn’t recognize the feeling until Ian soothed some of it away, and now he can’t be sure when it started. 

In front of him, Ian finally sinks down to his knees and starts working at the buttons on his jeans. While Ian pulls his pants down, Mickey touches the top of his head. His hair is so short now there’s nothing to grab on to or even run his fingers through, but Mickey touches the soft fuzz anyways. 

The bulb hanging above them gives a little flicker while his boxers fall to his ankles, and one of Ian’s hands goes to his dick like he’s tired of all this putting it off and wants to get to work already. His fingers wrap around it and his thumb plays with the tip while he presses his lips to Mickey’s hip bone. Each successive kiss brings him a little closer to the base of Mickey’s dick, until he’s finally there. Above his head, Mickey lets out a deep breath when Ian takes him into his mouth. 

Mickey just watches. He watches Ian’s head as it pulls back and then presses forward again until he’s got his entire cock in his mouth, and watches as he takes him deep, again and again, until there’s spit running down his balls. He can feel the ridge on the roof of Ian’s mouth, the saliva, the soft press of his tongue, and when Ian takes him all the way in again while at the same time humming deep in the back of his throat, Mickey lets out a moan for the two of them to hear together. 

The shelf behind him rattles when he has to grab hold of it to keep himself upright, and when Ian hears it, he glances up and they make eye contact. The spit, his hard cock, Ian’s soft eyes and long fingers digging into the front of his hips because Mickey hasn’t been trying to control himself at all. He’s got a front row seat to all of it, and if he wasn’t on fire with the  _ need _ to continue, he would force Ian to stay just like this forever. 

He can’t last forever though. Not when Ian’s head is bobbing again, and he’s still humming, and Mickey loses track of time just watching him. He can feel his heartbeat starting to pick up again. This closet is so quiet, so cut off from the rest of the world, the occasional, sloppy sounds Ian’s mouth makes are the only noises louder than his own sharp breaths.

As far as apologies go, it’s not bad. Pretty fucking great actually, and his only complaint is that he’s about to put an end to the whole thing because Ian’s either gotten much better at giving head, or he’s gotten more sensitive to receiving it. The more he tries to control himself, to hold those overwhelming feelings off, the better everything Ian’s doing to his dick feels. Until finally he’s half bent over, one hand still holding on to the shelf behind him for support, and saying things that really have no right coming out of his mouth at all: about how good Ian’s tongue feels, how deep he’s taking him, how fucking  _ close  _ he is, and how Ian could do anything to him - anytime - and Mickey would just fucking let him.

He talks until there are no words left in his head, and then he just hangs, right on the edge of his orgasm, for a few maddening seconds of bliss before coming in Ian’s mouth with a loud groan he can’t physically hold inside. For a few, wonderful seconds, there’s nothing in Mickey’s world except for the intense feelings Ian has created in his body.

When he does open his eyes, he gets to watch Ian, now leaning back on his knees, head tilted towards the ceiling and eyes closed, jack himself off until he’s groaning too as he finishes all over the floor at Mickey’s feet. 

Overhead, the light gives another flicker while the woman in the poster bears sole witness to the obscene mess they’ve made. 

After a few moments, Ian looks up at him and asks, “So we’re square?” 

“Yeah, we’re square.”

He can’t remember the last time he felt so completely relaxed, and he lets Ian pull his boxers and pants up without comment. Doesn’t even object as he does up the zipper too, and button on his jeans. 

It’s not until Ian starts talking about work while he uses a paper towel to wipe off the mess on the floor with his shoe that Mickey feels anything but blissfully detached. 

“You’ll take your old job back at the store right?” Ian asks as he tosses the paper towel into a trash bin under the poster. 

“Jesus fucking christ.” Mickey groans, in frustration this time, “Can’t I have two fucking seconds?”

“It’s been more than two seconds.” 

He moves closer like he’s going to lean against him again, but, no longer in the mood, Mickey holds his hands out to stop him. 

“I don’t need a job.”

“Everyone needs a job, Mick.”

“I guess.” He says, but doesn’t commit either way.

Ian leaves the room first and, when he sees the coast is clear, waves Mickey out too. Apparently, Frank broke his bike - to avoid saying his name, Ian just calls him ‘that asshole’ - and also some project Debbie needed for school. Mickey didn’t plan on walking with him, but once he starts talking, there’s no good place to cut him off. They go a few blocks before Ian, who seems to have built up at least eight months of stories while Mickey’s been gone, takes so much as a few breaths between words. 

“What’s Wilco?” Mickey asks, because now he feels invested. 

“Some band a bunch of rich kids are into I guess. That’s not the point though. We’re just trying to get them to go to Fiona’s club night.”

“I thought those ‘club night’s’ were just for money laundering. What’s she doing getting messed up in that? The kickbacks alone would cost a fortune.”

“I know... Lip is pissed, but I kind of get it. I think she’s just sick of always barely getting by.” 

Mickey gets it too, but jumping head-first into a cash-only business like that is a great way to get yourself disappeared. Ian looks worried enough though, so he doesn’t say any more about it. 

Instead of going home they walk past the Kash-and-Grab, and Ian leads them to a place where the better part of a city block caught fire. It looks like construction had started at some point to replace the burnt buildings, but now the whole place sits half-done, quiet, and abandoned. Probably in a limbo of permits and legislation. 

“I want to show you something.” Ian says as he slips through a gap in the chain link fence. They walk through the alleys between the long forgotten buildings where graffiti stares down at them from every wall, and the dried grass growing through cracks in the concrete hides a mixture of some of the dankest trash Mickey’s ever seen. He follows Ian over broken construction equipment and crumbling brick walls with no idea what to expect. Eventually, they come to a place that looks like it had once been intended as an open-air courtyard but was left unfinished halfway through. 

Round, steel supports cross overhead and a scaffold covered in a torn painter's tarp stands at the far end. Between them and the scaffold is what could kindly be described as an obstacle course. Built out of spare tires, empty cable reels, and mismatched wooden boards, the makeshift course covers the whole forty foot area and looks like a training yard for a third-world paramilitary group. 

Ian is looking at him like he’s waiting for Mickey to comment. 

“This is…” but he has to look around again before he can say anything. “You make this?”

“Yeah,” Ian replies quickly, but he’s looking embarrassed now. “What do you think?”

“I think it’s fucking amazing!” Mickey climbs onto the nearest cable reel to get a good look around. There’s walls enclosing the entire space giving it a feeling of privacy, and the potential for target practice and weed smoking away from cops and nosy neighbors seems endless. 

Mickey lets out a rooster crow and listens to it echo around the neighboring buildings where it’s joined by Ian’s when he lets out one of his own. They laugh while Mickey lowers himself to sit on the reel and Ian pulls himself up to sit beside him. 

“You really like it?” He asks.

“Fuck yeah. Should have told me. I would have brought my gun, and some beer.” 

Sure it’s a little...odd, thinking about Ian doing all this alone. About how he must have dragged in every piece until it was exactly where he wanted it, and all of it between work and school and god-knows what else he gets up to. But Gallagher’s always been intense when it comes to his dream of getting into the army. As for himself, Mickey can’t remember ever putting this much effort into anything, but maybe he’s not the best judge of normal. 

They stay until the sun starts to set, running through the tires until Mickey’s out of breath and has to tackle Ian to get him to stop, climbing the scaffolding in a race to see who makes it up first, smoking and talking. Mickey hands over his cigarette so he can do an inaccurate but funny impression of the warden, and it makes Ian laugh so hard he drops the cigarette anyway. If it’s not the best thing that’s happened to Mickey all year, then it’s definitely close. 

The day still has to end. Just as the sky is beginning to turn orange, Ian jumps up in the middle of a push-up competition like he’s suddenly remembered something. 

“Oh shit,” he says, grabbing his shirt from the top of a tire stack and pulling it on quickly. “I have to go help Lip with the Wilco thing.” 

Then he’s running back the way they came. Before he disappears completely, he calls over his shoulder that Mickey should come by the Kash-and-Grab tomorrow. After that he’s gone, and Mickey is left to do push-ups alone. 

*-*-*

He doesn’t make it to the Kash-and-Grab until late afternoon the next day. It’s the weekend, and Terry’s gotten over his annoyance with Mickey long enough to send him out to the local chop-shop to pick up a payment. He gets stuck waiting while Manny helps a legitimate customer, and stands by the hydraulic lift, where everything smells like exhaust fumes and motor oil, to have a half-conversation with another mechanic over the sound of drills. 

Finally Manny finishes up, gets Mickey the money, and sends him on his way. When he gets back home, Terry has him clean all the pistols in the house, twelve in total -thirteen if you count his Glock, but it’s already clean - even though Mickey’s pretty sure his father has no intention of using them. Just bitch work, but that’s alright. 

When he’s finally done, hands black with powder and smelling strongly of gun oil and cleaning solution, he’s starting to question his desire to get back on Terry’s good side. He puts everything back into the closet and on the racks and slips out the backdoor before anyone can think of anything else they need him for. 

Ian’s at the Kash-and-Grab when he gets there. Bored, behind the counter, and reading a magazine like this is last year and they’re going to have a quick bang in the stockroom before Mickey starts his shift in earnest. 

Further cementing the feeling that the last eight months never happened, Ian looks up when he comes in, frowns, and says, “Where have you been?” As if Mickey’s just shown up late for one of his shifts, again. 

“Busy. And you’re not my boss.” Mickey grabs a candy bar off the shelf and puts a five down which Ian makes change for. 

“I could be.” He says it like it’s innuendo for something, and it almost makes Mickey smile. 

“You gonna be stuck here all day?” 

“ _ We  _ are.” Ian reaches under the counter and pulls out Mickey’s old security jacket as though he’s been keeping it there in anticipation of his return. “This is a good gig for you. Keeps you out of trouble.”

Mickey thinks that’s highly unlikely. He’s old enough now, a real, working member of the family, and trouble is going to start finding him anywhere: school, home, here. Anywhere he goes, there he is. He takes the jacket from Ian anyways and agrees to work when he has the time. 

The pay is shit, but the benefits more than make up for it. 

*-*-*

The entire week following that, he has a chance to live life in a way he hasn’t for a long time, and it really does feel like things are getting better. He works nights to keep Terry happy: this week it’s driving from drop point to drop point, sometimes picking up and sometimes leaving packages. He never sees anyone else at the spots, never looks inside any of the packages, would rather not know what he’s carrying around. 

During the days, he follows Ian to school and makes new clients with drugs he buys from Terry’s contacts on his own dime. The students never buy in quantity, but they also don't say shit if the bud is weak or the coke less pure. So, it evens out. 

Afternoons and evenings are spent working with Ian at the store. Linda has more or less stopped trying to police the place now that she’s found a guy with a downtown condo more than twenty stories up who doesn’t mind her three kids. As long as the money in the till and the stock in the store match, they’re pretty much allowed to do whatever they want. 

He sleeps in between everything else. Falling onto his mattress at one in the afternoon, and then rolling back out at four so he can meet Ian at the shop, or when it’s slow and Ian’s busy with homework, he’ll crawl onto the pallets by the loading bay and drift off until it’s time to close. 

On Thursday, around dinner time, they’re closing up after a particularly slow afternoon. All day everything was fine between them, until twenty minutes ago when they had been talking about something stupid, and Ian had casually let it drop that he’s been seeing someone else. Which, fair enough. More than fair actually, but Mickey doesn’t want to talk about it, or anything else now for that matter, and their conversation has dried up while the minute hand ticks past closing and Ian’s dawdling at the register like he’s not ready to leave yet. 

“Why don’t we go somewhere tonight?” He says fiddling with the stack of fives in his hand he’s already counted twice.

Mickey doesn’t want to play the  _ where do you want to go? _ game tonight so he shrugs and says nothing. 

“I’ll get some booze, snacks. We can go to that place I showed you. The one by all the empty buildings.”

“Sure. Whatever.” The sun will be out for maybe another hour, which means Terry won’t need him for work for at least another two. 

The sky is turning a violent orange by the time they make it to the place. Through the gap in the chainlink, over the equipment where sticker bushes have started their slow takeover, sprouting thorny vines through the gears. He’s only been here once. Ian knows the way through better than he does and takes the lead. Sometimes going ahead to check the footing, sometimes staying behind to watch Mickey scale the walls as though he needs to be there to catch him if he falls.

The air stays warm as they navigate the complex, and only the occasional breeze comes through the openings in the walls, cooling everything down again. By the time they get to the secluded courtyard, Mickey’s hot enough to take his hooded vest and tank top off and throw them to the side. Fair-skinned Ian has no such problem, and continues to look like he just walked out of the pages of a magazine; even with brick dust and dirt all over his hands. 

Mickey looks at him under the long shadows of the evening sun and gets so caught up in his arms, the way his jeans fall against his legs, and just the way he holds the tension in his body: like there’s so much to  _ do _ in the world. It’s nothing like Mickey who feels stress as a kind of anger, and it only makes him want to fight - against himself or other people or the world in general - until the feeling goes away. 

He makes a mental checklist as his eyes go up: the stance of Ian’s legs, the freckles on his arms, the build of his chest, his smile - wide now - and before he can go any further he realizes Ian’s been staring at him this whole time too. 

“I fucking knew it!” Ian yells out, but he sounds elated, not angry.

“Knew what?” Mickey asks, fumbling around with his backpack now, embarrassed he got caught in his own thoughts. Looking at Ian like he’s some piece of art instead of just the kid down the street. 

“Nothing, I just knew it. It’s just...you act like such an  _ asshole _ sometimes.” He’s not yelling anymore, but he’s still talking excitedly. While Mickey pulls the bottle of whisky from his backpack, Ian jumps onto a nearby two-by-four balanced on a sawhorse and plays a precarious game of teeter-totter with himself. 

“If I’m such an asshole, why don’t you just fuck off?”

“Because I give a shit about you, Mickey!” To an outsider it might sound like he’s angry, but Mickey knows that tone is still just a part of his same mood. The elation, or excitement, or whatever Ian’s feeling tonight that’s got him so energized. 

“Alright, alright.” He waves Ian off without really hearing him, takes a long drag of his cigarette, a gulp of the whisky, and blows his breath out so he can taste them both in his throat like fire. He holds the bottle out to Ian, but makes him come down from the sawhorse before he hands it over. 

Ian jumps down and holds his hand out for the bottle, but at the last second Mickey pulls it back and takes another swig for himself. They stare at each other playfully, challenging, and all at once Ian’s stance loses his casualness. His knees bend slightly, his shoulders tense, and now it looks and feels like he’s stalking Mickey; testing his protective stance around the bottle for weak points. They’re smiling, each just seconds away from a laugh that would give their opponent a perfect opportunity to strike. 

Ian feints left and he’s so fast Mickey’s body responds, pulling him into a crouch with the bottle on his right side, even though his mind knows it’s a trick. Sure enough, mid-step Ian switches direction and comes at him from the right instead. He only just gets his fingers on the bottle before Mickey pulls it out of his reach, but now his back is to Ian who takes the easy advantage and wraps one of his arms tightly around Mickey’s waist and the other in a loose hold around his neck. Nowhere else to go, Mickey surprises Ian by buckling his legs and, rather than let go, Ian allows himself to be dragged to the ground with him. Some of the whisky sloshes out onto Mickey’s hand, but he mostly manages to keep the bottle upright even when they both start laughing. 

“Just give me some.” Ian reaches his arm out, but he can’t quite reach when Mickey holds the bottle away as far as he can.

“No! If you wanted some, Gallagher, you should have brought your own.” Their struggle is going to scratch the hell out of his bare arms and chest against the rough ground, but he still doesn’t give in. 

“It is mine. I paid for it.” Ian says between huffs of breath.

“I don’t see your name-” Mickey starts, but then Ian’s hand finds a ticklish spot just under his ribs and Mickey curls into a defensive ball immediately, terrified Ian wont stop. “Okay, just take it,” he says breathlessly, “Just take it.”

Ian snatches the bottle out of his hands and stands up.

“That’s what I thought.”

He takes a few gulps from the whiskey under the orange light of the setting sun while Mickey uncurls, sprawls out on the warm pavement, and just watches him. His cigarette is on the ground a few feet from his head, completely extinguished. 

They stay until it’s completely dark, the only light coming from distant streetlamps and an industrial sized flashlight with working batteries Ian’s scavenged from the abandoned equipment. 

The whiskey is gone. Mickey is wasted, laying on top of the scaffold staring up at the unfinished rafters and feeling a gentle swaying sensation in his body as though he’s not a boy, but an old ship, somewhere out at sea tonight. 

Ian is below him, still working off energy. He’s stumbling his way through the course and every so often takes a wobbly tumble right onto his ass and lets out a drunk laugh like he’s enjoying himself. The sound makes Mickey feel extremely content. After one such laugh, there’s a minute of silence where he doesn’t hear Ian at all, but when he gets nervous and pulls himself up to look, he’s still right there standing in the middle of the course and looking up towards the sky. 

Spring isn’t quite done with the city yet, and even though Mickey’s put his tank top and vest back on, he’s starting to feel a chill through the temporary warmth of the whiskey. After a moment, Ian looks over and catches him staring.

“Wanna see the stars, Mick.” He’s slurring a little, but Mickey can understand him just fine. 

“Look up.”

Ian does, but he doesn’t look satisfied with what he sees.

“There’s nothing up there.”

That’s not true. There’s rafters and beams and concrete buildings that block out the skyline. But stars? No, Mickey guesses, there’s probably not many stars up there.

“Okay, you want stars? I’ll find you some stars.” He mumbles, mostly to himself, as he climbs down off the scaffold. He has no idea how he managed to get onto this thing now. It’s so tall and so much of the metal is sharp corners waiting to catch his clothes or scratch his skin. He hangs from his fingertips off the top for a moment then drops to the ground, but misjudges his legs ability to support him after the drop, and would have taken a tumble onto his own butt if he didn’t manage to catch himself on one of the scaffold supports at the last second. When the world stops spinning below him, he looks back at Ian and catches him watching the whole thing with a smile on his face.

“Fuck off.” Mickey says, and brushes his dusty hands off onto his jeans. He takes the flashlight by the handle to bring with them, and grabs Ian by the arm too as he walks by. 

Ian lets himself be led along, but when he asks, “Where are we going?” Mickey doesn’t answer. He’s too focused on finding a good path between the trash and cracked cement, worried that one wrong step on a wobbly cinder block or rotted board could mean a broken ankle for either of them. Ian stays close though and they make it into one of the burnt out buildings without incident. 

The empty holes once filled by glass windows make it seem from the outside that being between the walls would be no different from any of the open space where they just were, but as soon as they get inside, Mickey feels the change. The air is cooler in here, and it smells fresher without all the dust and dirt stirred up in it. He hadn’t been paying attention to the distant sounds of cars before, but notices the absence of it now.

Their heavy breaths and echoing footsteps are the only noises in here.

Mickey stops a few feet inside to shine the flashlight around, and Ian crowds against him in the same way Mandy does when she’s nervous. There’s nothing to be nervous about in here though. The flashlight shines on more graffiti, lots of rotting trash, a yellowing mattress on the floor in a far corner, and a few large cobwebs full of dust swinging from the ceiling. The air is so still, they would hear it if someone was trying to hide from them in the dark, but when he stops to listen, nothing stirs. Finally, the flashlight shows him what he’s looking for: on the far wall is an empty doorway, and beyond it he can see a set of stairs going up into the dark. 

He tries to pull Ian forward again, but this time he’s met with resistance. 

“Are you serious?” Ian asks, and looks back the way they came. “This place is so creepy.”

“Don’t be a pussy.” He’s still feeling the whisky and it’s combined with his decision to get to the roof now. He’ll take Ian up there and prove one and for all, anything he wants, Mickey can get him. “It’s fine. I’m right here.”

This time when he pulls, Ian follows him with minimal resistance. 

The area that houses the stairs is large and there’s no windows to cast even the faintest glow of light through the vertical hallway. The stairs themselves are concrete and undamaged from the fire, and when they get to the bottom, Mickey shines the light upwards through the flights. He feels a sudden jolt of fear when he does it, fear that someone - or some _ thing  _ \- will stick its shadowy head over the edge and look back down at them, but it’s just Ian’s nervousness rubbing off on him. There’s nothing above them but the steps and cobwebs and faintly, at least eight stories up, the solid black ceiling of the roof. 

“C’mon.” He says quietly, not wanting to hear his voice echo in here. He keeps the flashlight in one hand trained on the steps in front of them to make sure there’s nothing in the way they’ll trip on. The other hand is tightly fisted in Ian’s shirt, always just one step behind him, to make sure he doesn’t get too close to the edge. Maybe he’s being over cautious, but the railing is gone in some places, and even where it’s still standing, it looks rusted and dangerously unstable. Especially when they’re a few floors up and the chance of one of them taking a drunken tumble over the edge starts to feel more possible. 

He forgets to count the floors as they walk by, but eventually they make it to the top where there’s another open hole of a doorway, this one leading out to the roof. He lets go of his shirt so Ian can go out ahead of him and take a deep breath of fresh air. 

“It’s so nice up here.” Ian says, and he does a slow spin to take in the view, but then has to rest his hands on his knees for a moment like it made him feel sick. 

A quick glance around the roof tells Mickey it’s open and flat, and he switches off the flashlight so their eyes can adjust to the dark. He looks up, hoping to see what he had promised Ian. 

A few stars, he would have just settled for three or four, but there’s none. The sky is just black, with the slightest tinge of yellow from the city lights. He looks at Ian, who’s also looking up at the sky, and wants to tell him he had tried, that this isn’t the best he can do, and one day he’ll take Ian out of the city and they’ll see so many stars-

“Look! I see one.” Ian says, and points up to where he’s looking in the sky. “And there’s another one! Come here.”

He makes a ‘hurry up’ gesture with his hand, and Mickey has to stand with his face right next to Ian’s before he can see what he’s pointing at. 

“That’s a plane.”

“It is not. Look, there’s another one.”

Ian’s right. Now that Mickey’s looking closer, he can see them. Tiny, faint, white glimmers that multiply once you start to notice the first few. 

They look up until standing with his head like that makes Mickey feel dizzy, and he has to sit down. Ian just keeps looking up, and neither of them says anything for a few minutes. 

“Thanks, Mickey.” Ian says eventually.

“Mmm…” Mickey says from the ground, suddenly very tired and struggling to keep his eyes open. 

He’s going to catch shit for staying out this late when Terry probably had something for him to do, and they still have to make it all the way out of the building with nothing but the flashlight to guide them, but he lets Ian look until he’s had his fill. 

When Ian’s satisfied, and starting to yawn too, Mickey switches the flashlight on and leads them back down the steps.

*-*-*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay this one was kinda short, but I'll have another chapter up by the end of the week :)


	3. Daddy Issues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mickey and Ian both want to make it totally clear how much they definitely don't mind they have an open relationship. And Mickey does some extracurricular work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you guys for reading, commenting, and the love! Hope you enjoy!

Season 3;  Chapter 3: Daddy Issues

  
  


By Sunday, he’s really got a groove going. With no work until the afternoon with Ian, he’s playing Xbox on the new flatscreen when Terry comes home; back from the bar even though he left less than an hour ago. 

“Get the bats,” he says, “We’re gonna go beat up a kid-fucker.”

It sounds like Mickey’s kind of party.

They meet up with the Gallagher brothers, who usually keep out of this kind of thing but are all riled up today, and the impromptu mob goes to welcome the pedophile to the neighborhood, Yards style. 

But it’s a woman. Not just any woman either, but blonde, tiny, and timid, and the steam goes out of the whole group like a popped balloon. There isn’t any debate, just an instant consensus that there’s not going to be a beat-down - not here at least - and the mob splits in search of someone else to take out its anger on. 

He stays behind with Ian and Lip, but regrets it. Something about seeing that woman, and the way Lip is talking now, is putting him on the defensive. Like a formless kind of anger; it would have been nice to work it out on some unsuspecting asshole. 

What do her bullshit ideas about love have to do with him anyway? It’s fine to beat up a kid-fucker if it’s a guy - preferably one that  _ looks _ like a pedofile - but if it’s a woman, a  _ pretty _ woman, then they should just let her go on her way? No questions asked because of the way she looks, the way she acts. 

He can understand that… kind of. 

It’s not really about  _ what _ you do, it’s all about what other people  _ think _ about what you do. Or something. That doesn’t seem to make sense, but Mickey also can’t understand why he’s the only one around that wants to question it. If it really was irrational, then someone else - someone smarter than him - would have brought it up already, and he’s probably just being stupid about the whole thing. If what other people think about him is what really matters, he can do anything he wants as long as he pretends to be normal for everyone else. 

Hell, it sure worked for that bitch. 

He can act normal; he’s been doing it his whole life. His problems didn’t really start until he met Ian. What gives Gallagher the right, anyways, to stay silent when all the other men are talking about hot women? Where Mickey’s spent his whole life trying to fit in, Ian doesn’t even bother. It’s laziness, or apathy, or both, and it leaves Mickey stuck in the middle trying to pick up the slack for the two of them. For that matter, what gives Ian the right to fuck other guys? He’s not even pretending to date Mandy anymore. If someone suspects, what’s he going to do? Point to his other lovers and say, ‘I’m not fucking Mickey, and here’s my boyfriend to prove it.’

So it falls on him to protect their reputation because Ian, like always, can’t be bothered. 

Can’t even be bothered to comment on how hot that teacher was in front of his own brother so that falls to Mickey too, and when he sees Angie it’s like a lifeline because she can help him prove-

_ once and for all _

-that he’s not gay.

_ again. _

“Hey Angie, wanna fuck?”

*-*-*

He’s still thinking bitterly about Ian’s indifference when they get inside and he follows Angie to her room. Today there’s a boy, about five, sitting on the couch in the front room watching a Chic-a-go-go on the TV. Angie gives his head a pat, and when he holds a little sippy cup out she goes into the kitchen to fill it, and Mickey stands behind the couch and watches the people dance on the screen. 

“I like Ratzo.” The boy says.

“Yeah, he’s cool.” Mickey answers.

Angie comes back with the full cup and the boy takes it without any further comment. They leave him to his show. 

Somewhere in his mind he’s still thinking about the other guy Ian’s seeing, a domino effect of his previous train of thoughts, and by the time Angie starts drawing her bedroom curtains like she had the last time, he’s only succeeded in annoying himself even more. At least the dark room will hide the scowl on his face from her. 

Some days, his dick will get hard for anything. Any errant thought that even hints at sex, and he’s at full attention, ready to party whether there’s anything actually going on or not. Other times, it’s the opposite. No matter how much he thinks about the things that typically get him going, or internally begs his body to  _ please _ send the blood down south so he can do whatever it is he needs to, his dick remains stubbornly soft like it too is punishing him for the things he really can’t help but want. He hasn’t figured out how to prevent that from happening, but at least he’s gotten better at recognizing when it’s going to. 

“Hey, Angie.” He says before she can start undressing. 

“Yeah?”

He’s still standing in the doorway of her bedroom, and he’s certain if he gets into that bed now, in the dark, nothing good will happen. 

“I, uh, can we not? Today.”

“Oh. Did I do something?” Her voice sounds disappointed, which is somehow worse than suspicious. Maybe it’s because he can hear some of himself, in the fake casualness of her question. Isn’t that why Angie’s perfect though? Because if he turns her down, she’ll assume it’s her fault and not his. 

“Nah. It’s just...hot today.”

“Oh, yeah, It is pretty hot. I’d probably be all sweaty anyways.” She says the last part all in one breath. Then, before he has a chance to reply, asks, “Do you want a sandwich?”

That actually sounds pretty nice, and he agrees to wait while she makes him one. As soon as she leaves, he opens the blinds again and the room looks much better when the sun can come in. He crawls onto her bed and lays in the sunlight, rubbing his temples. 

Ian’s always been clear about his plans: army and then some other guy to get him out of the slums. It’s Mickey who hasn’t made any plans - beyond the stack of money he’s been collecting for  _ maybe _ an apartment and  _ maybe  _ a future outside the Yards - and it’s also Mickey who doesn’t have Ian’s looks or the infinite store of patience needed to talk to guys who actually have money and want to spend it ‘helping’ some poor kid move up. 

The reality of Mickey’s life is sitting right in front of him, and he needs to stop pretending that it isn’t. 

For whatever reason, Angie seems to like him. He could take her home to Terry, move her into his room, marry her, and keep working and seeing Ian on the side. With Angie at home, and maybe some kids of their own, no one will have anything to say about him and Gallagher. 

Her sandwich only makes the point for him. It’s thick with turkey, ham, and cheese, and there’s potato chips on the side. Bar-b-q, his favorite. Maybe Terry’s been right all along; what’s so bad about having a wife at home to make him sandwiches like this after a long day?

“This is good.” He says after a few bites. “Sorry about earlier.”

“It’s fine, I’ve got…” She sets her sandwich down on her plate and looks away, and for a few seconds he doesn’t think she’ll continue. Eventually, she says it. “A vibrator, or whatever, so it’s fine.”

“A what?”

“Don’t be an asshole.” She says sharply, and he can see she’s embarrassed. 

“I don’t fucking try to be.” He says honestly. 

“You seriously don’t know?” She looks at him and whatever she sees must satisfy her, because she continues, “It’s like..a sex toy, Mickey. For masturbating.”

The last word is too much, and they both have to look away from each other. Mickey chooses the window. They were been talking about sex, sure, but somehow the idea of doing it with yourself is so much more embarrassing. He knows what she’s talking about now at least. 

“Like in porn?”

“It’s not just for porn stars.” She says a little defensively, but Mickey can hear nervousness just under that as well. “Every girl should have one. It’s normal. I got it at that shop over by the Gold Pawn.”

“Okay.”

“Alright.”

He takes another bite of his sandwich, chews it, and thinks. 

“You always, you know, use it? When you can’t have sex?”

“Not always.” She shrugs and finishes the last bite of her own sandwich. “Sometimes it’s better.”

“Better? So you could...you know. When you get married, they say - but you’d be fine? With just that.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” 

She’s looking at him like he’s crazy, and he can’t believe he just said any of that outloud.

“Fuck. I don’t know. I had a weird morning. You know you live next to a kid-fucker, right?”

“What?”

“Yeah. That teacher next door fucked one of her students, I guess.”

“Oh...ew. I made her a casserole when she moved in.” Angie wipes her hands on her pants distractedly while she talks as though she can wipe away the past association. 

They talk about her for a bit, but soon Mickey starts craving a cigarette and doesn’t feel like smoking it in Angie’s room again. He tells her he’s going to head out, forgets to thank her for the sandwich, but tells her to enjoy herself when he’s gone and doesn’t mind at all the blush it puts on her face when he says it. 

*-*-*

He doesn’t know what time it is, if he’s early or late to his shift, but when he gets there Ian’s already inside pulling a dolly full of cans to the front to stock the shelves. 

“Want some help?” He asks, but Ian starts the shift off by glaring at him. One minute in and Mickey’s already fucked up. He throws his hands up and goes to lean by the counter instead. 

“What, am I late or something?”

“How’s Angie?” Ian asks cryptically instead of answering. 

“She’s fine.” He shrugs, unsure why they’re talking about this, but it only seems to piss Ian off more. 

“Great.” He says, stabbing the box cutter into the plastic wrap with more force than necessary.

“What’s the matter, Gallagher, you jealous?” Mickey feels himself smile, and it’s really pissing Ian off but he can’t hold it in. “Fuck, you are. You go off,” Mickey lowers his voice out of habit even though there’s no one else in the store. “And fuck other guys, tell me about it, then I’m supposed to just...what?”

“I’m not jealous. You can do whatever you want.”

“You want me to sit around on my ass all day? Wait for your dick to be free.” He makes a move like he’s going to grab Ian through his pants, but Ian knocks his hand away with a look that says he’s not playing around.

“I said I’m not jealous, Mick. Fuck whoever you want.”

“Whatever.”

Mickey gets his jacket from under the counter then hangs out back there while Ian stocks so he can ring up the next few customers. The shelves full, Ian rolls the pallets back into the stockroom, and when he gets back out he finally breaks the silence. 

“Are you bi?”

“Buy what?” Mickey asks, looking down at the register confused.

“Bisexual. You know, into guys  _ and _ girls.”

“Don’t say that shit, man.” He’s almost certain there’s no one in the store, but walks out from behind the counter to check the aisles just in case. “I’m serious. Don’t ever call me any of that sexual shit. Just don’t. I’m not  _ bi _ . I’m not your fucking boyfriend. And the next time I hear that bullshit, I’m going to fucking lose it.”

Ian’s still glaring at him like he’s pissed, but there’s something sad in the look too that keeps Mickey’s anger in check. That, and he’s sure the store’s empty now. 

“Just, do you like girls or not?”

“Of course I like girls; everyone likes girls. They’ve got tits, what’s not to like?”

“I can’t tell if-”

The bell over the door rings, and they both jump and fall into a guilty silence. 

“Hey Mickey.” It’s Jenny, and when she sees the look on his face, the fake smile falls off hers. “It’s, like, cool if I still buy off you, right? It’s just, there’s no one else I know, and I brought money this-”

“Stop talking.” Ian cuts her off. 

She’s pulled a few twenties out of her pocket and he’s averting her eyes as though just seeing the money is a crime. 

Mickey knows he’s really in trouble this time when Ian slams his shoulder into him - hard and on purpose - as he walks by to hide in the back office from what’s about to happen, but he takes Jenny’s money anyways and gives her one of the baggies he’s been hiding under the counter with his jacket. After seeing Ian’s reaction though, he’s pretty sure he’ll have to find a different place to keep his stash. 

A few minutes after she leaves, Ian comes back. Ready to start bitching before Mickey even looks up from his magazine. 

The next hour is tense, and every time he tries to make a joke, Ian snaps at him again. Eventually, they agree that anyone who comes into the store looking to buy what Mickey’s selling, has to purchase something from the shop first, and under no circumstances does Ian ever see any drugs exchange hands. 

“Wouldn’t want to ruin your chances of getting as far away from me as possible.” Mickey says testily. Even though everything’s finally settled and he should know better than to needle at Ian when he’s already pissy. Instead of blowing up over the comment, Ian looks him in the eyes seriously for a second, and says:

“You left me, remember?”

It isn’t exactly how he remembers it, but Ian seems pretty sure. True or not, Mickey spends the next hour trying to get him to laugh, but all his jokes fall flat and nothing he says cuts through Ian’s hard glare.

After a disastrous attempt at following Ian’s rules for dealing in the shop - which does not bode well for a meeting he has set up for later with some local bikers - Ian brings up Angie again, asking if he really fucked her, but Mickey’s plenty ready for the question this time. 

Let Ian be jealous; see how it feels for once. 

*-*-*

He’s almost gotten Ian to actually smile for the first time this shift when the bikers show up, asking loudly for him and drawing looks from the other two customers. At least they’ve come in plain clothes, but by the time he gets them to shut the fuck up and wait for him in the back of the store, Ian’s frown has deepened enough to draw his eyebrows into it. 

It’s not even a deal, just a few details of a job for tonight they couldn’t exchange over the phone, but he can feel Ian’s disapproving looks even from the back of the store. 

He’s wrapping it up with them as fast as he can when the old man comes in. Mickey knows what kind of guys Ian goes for when he’s trying to compensate for his own shitty upbringing with sexual partners, but even so, he’s still taken by surprise watching the old guy attempt to flirt.

_ Ginger snap. _

He’s seen enough to know Ian isn’t the naive boy he sometimes pretends to be. It’s just a defense mechanism - and a damn good one - that he uses so when the smoke clears after any one of the chaotic scenes he either causes or gets caught up in, no one suspects that the clueless redhead had anything to do with it. Mickey has an advantage though: he grew up with Mandy. She used to use her pigtails and big eyes to pull the same shit over and over again. Usually with him on the other side, taking most of the fallout for her. But even with this inside knowledge, and plenty of examples that he’s smart enough to keep himself out of trouble when he actually wants to, Mickey still feels the impulse to protect Ian from himself and keep that guy as far away as possible. Whether Ian wants him to or not.

Mickey follows Ian to the restaurant. 

He knows this guy is a perv; he can sense it. Knows Ian is playing a game, but not what the end goal is. If what Ian wants is to be a kept boy for a rich fuck, he’s proven he can. If what Mickey really wants is a set of tits to marry and get pregnant, he’s proven he can as well. 

He watches through the window of the restaurant and sees grandpa order for both of them while Ian ignores the menu in front of him. 

He seems to be having a great time. It’s drinks and talking, casual touching, and all the things Ian always says he wants that sets Mickey on edge just watching it. He thought the beer would help him think more clearly about the whole thing, but so far it’s done nothing but make him more angry and less focused. He can’t help it, the guy doesn’t look like he could protect Ian from a toddler throwing a tantrum, but he’s got him out in public, all but flaunting the fact they’re queer. This is the nice part of town though, where the shops hire security to make sure no one does anything unpleasant near their rich clientele that might make them close their checkbooks. It’s exactly the kind of place Mickey could never take Ian too because even if he could afford the overpriced drinks, even if he went out and bought the right clothes, even if they sat at that same table and Mickey did everything right, he would still have to bring Ian back to the Yards when all was said and done. He can’t do both, and Ian might never be satisfied with what he  _ can  _ do. 

He could be though. He could be happy with exactly what they have just like everyone else in the Yards. They each have houses, income,  _ each other _ , and if Ian wasn’t such a perfect target for grandpas like this fuck who think they can buy his innocence with nice clothes and expensive drinks, he could be just as happy as Mickey with all they have back home. 

When things are good, when Terry’s satisfied and Frank’s found some other sucker’s couch to crash on, home is great. It’s a hell of a lot better than Juvie. They get to see each other every day, and Mickey knows all the rules and can make good money in the Yards. So what if they have to sneak around? They can build a good life there. And if Ian wants fancy drinks and a night out, Mickey will take him somewhere, someday, and they’ll do it together. If only Ian could be patient. If only he could wait. 

Finally the waiter drops their check off, and Mickey watches gramps put his credit card in the black folder without even glancing at the bill. He then does absolutely nothing as a man walking by their table stops to make some comment, and lets his wandering hand linger on Ian’s shoulder for too long to be appropriate. Mickey would have broken that hand, and the nose of the man it’s attached to, but gramps does nothing. His stupid, benign smile doesn’t even waver, and this is supposed to be Mickey’s competition?

_ You left me, remember? _

Ian had said that, and maybe he was right, but Mickey is back now and he’s not going anywhere. 

When he walks up to them on the street, Ian looks at him like he doesn’t know what Mickey’s doing here, like he hadn’t loudly made plans and walked here right from work so that Mickey could follow. 

“So this must be the boyfriend you were telling me about.” Grandpa says, looking at him like he knows him, and everything else falls out of Mickey’s mind like a floodgate has been opened.

_ Boyfriend _

All the arguments they’ve had, and still Ian’s been going around telling his geriatric lovers Mickey’s his boyfriend. 

_ Boyfriend _

What had he said he would do if he heard that word again? He can tell by his face, Ian remembers.

Mickey throws a headbutt and feels the satisfying crunch of hitting the softest part of some other guy’s face on the hardest part of his own. The vacant smile falls right off the old man’s face, and they all finally get a glimpse of the man he really is: aging, insecure, and fucking around with children because he’s too scared to interact with people his own age. 

He doesn’t feel bad at all beating this guy up. In fact, every punch he throws makes him feel a little better. Ian is trying to get him to stop, but Mickey can tell this guy can take a few more kicks before they get the hell out of here and he reminds Ian what being with him-

Ian hits him hard in the throat and reminds Mickey who  _ he’s  _ dealing with instead. For a moment he’s breathless and it really feels like he won’t be able to take in another one, but then his body gets over the sudden shock and he takes a deep inhale. He pulls himself off the ground while a small crowd gathers because Mickey was just trying to make a point, but ended up making a scene instead.

“Gallagher, let’s go!”

Ian could stay, coo over over that old fuck until the cops show up, but he doesn’t. He follows Mickey because that man is just a distraction, and Mickey is Ian’s…

Goddammit. 

They get away and take back alleys until they’ve almost made it all the way back to the Kash-and-grab. Ian had fun running from that two-bit security guard - Mickey finally got a laugh out of him after trying all afternoon - but the scowl’s slowly returned back to his face. They’re in the alley behind the neighborhood bar when Ian’s finally had enough walking, and he grabs Mickey’s tank top to get him to stop walking too. 

“What the fuck’s your problem?” He asks.

Mickey grabs Ian’s wrist and pulls the shirt out of his grasp. 

“I’m ain’t the one fucking old dudes because my dad doesn’t love me.”

Ian gives him the most incredulous look Mickey’s ever seen.

“Are you fucking serious?! You’re going to talk to me about daddy issues.”

“Look, do what you want on your own time,” Mickey backpedals before the conversation gets into dangerous territory.

“I was on my own time!”

“You’re acting like you’re someone else!” Mickey yells back. “You think you belong there, Gallagher? They can all tell-”

“You don’t get to tell me where I belong, Mickey!” 

When he’s this angry, there’s no question who Ian is or where he’s from, and if gramps saw his cute toy like this, he might think twice before showing him off at fancy bars.

“Wake up, Gallagher, you’re ghetto trash just like the rest of us.” He’s looking Ian in the eye to make sure his point gets across, and doesn’t realize he’s about to get hit before it’s too late. Ian’s punch lands, not in the face or his throat again, but far to his side, below his ribs, and Mickey’s never had a punch land that hurt so bad, so immediately. His legs give out while the rest of his body curls in on itself trying to simultaneously minimize the pain and make sure nothing like that ever happens again .

“Fuck!” He yells from the ground even though the movement in his chest sends a fresh wave of pain down his back. 

“Oh shit, Mick. I’m sorry.  _ Fuck _ . Are you okay?” He sounds genuinely repentant, but the apology falls on deaf ears. Once the pain isn’t so surprising and fresh, he rolls onto his side and starts to pull himself up, but when Ian reaches down to try and help, Mickey tells him to ‘fuck off’. 

Ian watches him struggle to his feet for a moment, then says he’s going to get something and disappears into the back door of the bar. By the time he reappears, the giant bartender - Kevin - behind him, Mickey’s managed to lean against the brick wall with his hands on his knees, taking shallow breaths to avoid moving too much. 

“What, are you guys holding a two-man fight club out here?” The bartender asks while Ian hands over two aspirin and an unopened can of Milwaukee Brew. 

Mickey swallows the pills dry but doesn’t take the beer. Instead, he waits until Ian’s holding it out just right, and repays the favor with a solid punch right into Ian’s undefended gut. 

“Hey!” The bartender yells, but now it’s Ian’s turn to fall to his knees. He gives a few painful retches Mickey thinks are for dramatic effect right up until he throws-up some his overpriced wine all over Mickey’s shoes. 

Maybe he’ll think twice next time before he whores himself out for drinks, runs from the cops, and starts a fight in an alleyway. Either way, it’s Mickey who’s going to have to hose off his shoes. 

From his knees, Ian throws the full can of beer and it hits Mickey right in the shin, momentarily distracting him from his bruised kidneys.

“Ow! Goddammit, Gallagher.”

“You’re such a dick! I said I was sorry.”

“Both of you get the fuck out of my alley, you goddamn psychos!”

*-*-*

He makes a show of limping until Ian apologizes again. There’s nothing he can do about his shoes except wash them off in the first spigot they come across, then feel his wet feet sloshing in them as they walk. 

He’s not angry anymore, at least, and Ian doesn’t seem to be either. There’s no more mention of Angie or old guy, and instead they talk about Mandy’s crazy scheme of applying to colleges for Lip. Ian seems a little happy, or at the very least unconcerned, about his brother’s imperiled future, but he’s pissed enough for the both of them at the way Lip’s been treating Mandy. Mickey feels exactly the opposite. If Mandy fucks up enough and Lip finally kicks her out, she’ll have to come home. He likes the house better when she’s around, and has barely seen her at all since he got out. 

Ian was too pissy to take any ‘breaks’ at work today, but now that they’ve more or less worked it out, there’s no question of what they’re going to do when they get to their secret obstacle course. All month, Mickey’s been sure they’ll come back one of these times and find the place raided, their stuff picked over or destroyed, but so far their secret has stayed hidden. Forgotten by the city and too difficult to reach for the average derelict. 

They have a small stash, mostly bullets, liquor, and cigarettes - nothing they can’t stand to lose - and Ian pulls out a bottle of Cuervo from it. He swishes and spits it back out onto the pavement, then takes a real gulp and hands it out to Mickey who shakes his head. 

“I gotta work soon.” 

“We just got off work.” But the look on Ian’s face says he knows exactly what Mickey’s talking about. 

He’s more worried than excited about tonight, but whatever he’s feeling, Mickey knows he’ll go through with it one way or another. 

When he doesn’t respond, Ian asks, “What are you going to do?”

“Don’t worry about it. So what do you say Gallagher, ready to go down on me now or what?” 

Ian takes another drink, hawks a loogie onto the cement, and shakes his head.

“Maybe if you hadn’t made me barf my lunch up. How about I just fuck you instead, and we call it even?”

He lets Ian grab him by the shirt and pull him over to one of the concrete walls that surround the enclosure. The heat coming off the cement is intense, but he doesn’t mind so much when Ian is pressing against his back and burying his nose in Mickey’s hair to just breathe him in. 

He lets Ian’s hands slide down his chest and into his pants and tries to stay still enough that he can feel his heartbeat through their shirts; until everything else is just background noise. Ian’s hand slips into his boxers and finds his dick, already getting hard. It’s his breath on the back of Mickey’s neck that always does it, sends hot tendrils of desire down his body and he can’t help but respond. He grinds his ass back on Ian’s crotch in appreciation for the feeling of the hand stroking his dick. 

“You know what the best part of all your stupid repression is?” Ian asks softly right in his ear. “You’re so fucking easy to get off.”

He accompanies the insult with some rough grinding, the hand on his cock stroking like Ian really is trying to get him off, and instead of a comeback all Mickey can do is gasp against the concrete wall. 

Ian’s hard too, Mickey can feel him through their jeans, and the way he’s grinding against his ass combined with the hand stroking him feels embarrassingly good. He doesn’t want him to stop anything he’s doing, but Mickey’s also afraid that if he continues, he’s only going to prove Ian right. 

He lets it continue, just for a minute, because the feeling is incredible. Warm tension in his thighs and crotch that he never wants to stop, but when Ian licks his earlobe and Mickey’s whole body twitches from the sensation, he pushes them both away from the wall before he ends up having to hose his pants off too. 

Even without the hand down his boxers, he still has to take a few breaths to calm his body down. Ian palms the bulge in his own jeans while he watches Mickey compose himself. 

“I thought you said you were gonna fuck me.”

“I know.” Ian agrees, but he rubs his hand against his forehead in frustration when he says it. “But then I remembered, I forgot lube.”

They don’t keep any here. Even if the summer heat wouldn’t ruin it, it’s not something Mickey wants to leave lying around with the rest of their things. 

He lets out a sharp laugh. Something about having Ian say they were going to fuck, makes Mickey think he’s not going to be satisfied until it happens, and if they don’t now, he has no idea when they’ll have another chance. Not until tomorrow at the very least. He is frustrated, at both of them, or just himself because he forgot as well, but Ian misinterprets the look on his face.

“You didn’t bring any either! I don’t know why this is my fault.”

“Fuckin’ relax, Gallagher. It’s fine” He holds his hand out intending to pull Ian into the same position as before so they can pull their pants out of the way and just go back to what they were doing, but Ian doesn’t take it. He’s in a bad mood today, and nothing Mickey’s done to try and fix it has helped much. 

“I don’t know why I’m so…” Ian shakes his head like he really is disappointed in himself, but before Mickey can say anything else his face changes as though he’s suddenly got an idea. “Turn around. I’m going to blow your mind.”

“If you think fucking me dry is going to blow my mind, I’ve got news for you.” Mickey says, but he turns around to face the wall again and unbuttons his pants pulling them down to his knees. When Ian stands behind him again, Mickey can feel he still has his jeans on. 

“Do you trust me?” He asks, and even hearing the words sends a bolt of fear through Mickey, but he gives himself a few seconds to think before he answers.

“I don’t know. Yeah, I guess.”

“Okay then, just relax. And, for fuck’s sake, don’t hit me again.”

“You hit me first.” Mickey says, but they’re just words to fill the silence, and keep himself from freaking out, because now Ian’s getting down on his knees behind him and he’s suddenly not sure what to expect. 

Even when Ian spreads his cheeks, he’s not one hundred percent sure that he’s actually going to go through with it. He’s seen enough porn, mostly on the couch with his brothers, to understand, but there nothing in the world short of the actual sensation of Ian licking him down there that could have convinced Mickey he’d experience something like that in real life. 

For the first few seconds he’s certain - and it really has nothing to do with trust - that he can’t let this happen, and he’ll have to make Ian stop. Then he starts to really  _ feel _ it. Just like earlier, when Ian had been stroking his dick and grinding against him, the pleasure hits him hard and he no longer wants to stop.

“Jesus. Fuck.” 

He wants to say something to Ian, so maybe he’ll wake up to what’s happening and stop himself, but there’s no way to make anything coherent come out of his mouth when Ian’s tongue does another pass and Mickey’s never felt so physically sensitive to anything. This,  _ this, _ is the most obscene thing anyone’s ever done to Mickey, and of course it’s Ian doing it again. 

His tongue doesn’t stop. It licks circles around Mickey’s hole until his hands are clenching against the wall, grabbing at nothing. Then, when Mickey’s just starting to think about jerking himself off, even though he’s not sure he can take the added stimulation without putting an early end to this whole thing, Ian slips his tongue inside. 

Everything is so wet, Ian’s breath is so warm, and his tongue is stretching Mickey in the tiniest but most amazing way, and he kind of wants this to go on for hours. Days. He doesn’t ever want it to stop even though five minutes ago he couldn’t imagine starting. 

Ian doesn’t really give him a choice though. He keeps licking and then slides one of his fingers inside Mickey and the way it curls, searching and feeling, has Mickey’s hand going to his dick without his conscious input. It’s too much to stand without touching himself, and he doesn’t have the self control not to jack himself off right over the edge with Ian’s finger still inside him and his tongue teasing around it in a way that might tickle any other time but right now feels like it’s every part as instrumental to his orgasm as his own hand. 

He makes a rough, gasping sound as he comes, unable to care about anything but what he’s feeling in his stomach and his toes and mostly his ass where Ian’s still just playing with him like he’s a toy. There’s nothing else to think about, nothing left inside his mind. There’s no more Mickey, no Ian, no work, drugs, or money. Just this warm, cement wall that’s keeping him upright and the feeling of his own pounding heart in his chest. Maybe Ian says something about being right as he stands up behind him, but Mickey isn’t listening, doesn’t bother trying to respond.

They’ve done it again -  _ he’s  _ done it again - crossed some line he’ll never be able to go back from, and now he has to spend the rest of his life knowing exactly what it feels like to have Ian’s tongue in his ass and he won’t ever be able to forget. Ian’s right again: he’s blown Mickey’s mind. But that might not be the good thing he seems to think it is. 

He’s been leaning against the wall, his face buried in one of his arms, for too long but he’s not done collecting himself yet. Ian doesn’t wait. He puts a hand on Mickey’s shoulder gently, and even though he knows exactly who it is, it still makes him flinch. 

“Jesus, Mickey, are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” He mumbles into his arm, but Ian can’t understand him and tells him so. 

“I said, I’m fine.” He pulls off the wall and bends over to get his pants back up. “Better than…” He tries to finish, but starts laughing instead. The absurdity of what Ian’s just done, mixed with how incredible it felt, has him feeling a little askew from reality. In between bouts of laughter he manages to say, “You’re fucking disgusting, Gallagher.” 

For a second Ian looks offended, but something about the openly amused expression on Mickey’s face, or the sound of his laughter, must get to him because he starts laughing too. 

“I told you I was going to blow your fucking mind.” Ian says once they’ve both calmed down enough to talk again. He’s found the bottle of Cuervo again and takes a few more drinks, but doesn’t swish or spit like he had after vomiting, and Mickey can’t believe the taste in his mouth now could really be better than that, but he has enough good sense not to mention it. 

_ Because some day,  _ he thinks,  _ I’m going to want him to do that again.  _

He does, however, say, “I can’t believe you did that,” And Ian gives him a patronizing look like Mickey’s a child who doesn’t know how the world works. 

“So you’re not going to return the favor?”

“ _ Fuck  _ no.” 

It really is getting late, and he has to go home so he can fill his family in on the rest of the details before they need to leave, but Ian’s right: it’d be pretty damn selfish of him to just leave after that. 

“Fuck the lube. After that, you can fuck me any way you want. Seriously.” He starts pulling at his belt again to show Ian he’s serious, but Ian takes another drink and shakes his head. 

“No it’s okay. I won’t forget next time.” There’s nothing sad, or hurt, in his expression now, but there’s still something off about it - like Ian’s lost, or not exactly sure he is where he’s supposed to be - and for a second it scares Mickey. Even though there’s nothing to be scared about. Ian’s right here, and Mickey is here, and there’s no reason to think that anything that comes up, they won’t be able to handle it together. 

“Seriously, man. I won’t be able to stop thinking about it until we do.” Mickey knocks his knuckles gently into Ian’s shoulder, trying to get that look to go away. “You’ve been rough before.” He’s about to say that he likes it that way, but before he can, Ian interrupts.

“You think I don’t feel bad about that? It’s literally not worth hurting you, Mickey, ever.”

He opens his mouth to respond, then finds there’s nothing to say. 

“Don’t go tonight.” Ian continues, and for a second Mickey isn’t sure what he’s talking about. “Whatever it is. Just, don’t. Come home with me and we’ll watch a movie or something. Sit two feet apart on the couch. Whatever you want.”

Mickey just shakes his head.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. Everything’s going to be fine; I do this shit all the time.” It’s a relief, if that’s all that’s got Ian worried though. “I’ll walk you home. Then, I’ll see you tomorrow at the shop.”

Ian puts his hands in his pockets and bends tensely at the waist for a moment like he’s debating whether or not to push the subject, but then he just sighs and gives in, following Mickey out of the complex and back to their block without another word.

*-*-*

Mickey doesn’t realize how much trouble he’s in for being late until he gets back in sight of the house and sees Terry and his brothers all waiting by the car. 

“Where the fuck have you been?” Iggy yells and throws a half empty beer bottle towards him that shatters on the sidewalk a few steps in front of his feet. 

“At fucking work!” Mickey says defensively, but he knows he’s fucked up. He was supposed to get the info they needed and report back and instead he was...distracted.

“Bullshit. Tony checked and said the place was closed up.” 

Mickey looks at Tony mostly to avoid looking at Terry, but his brother is staring at the ground looking like he either wishes he hadn’t been sent to check or that he hadn’t reported what he saw.

“Well then he must have just missed me, I-”

“Enough!” Terry yells, and everyone falls silent. “Did you get what we needed?”

“Yeah.” Mickey says, now looking at the ground as well, “He said it’s leaving the distribution center from downtown at midnight, a sixteen-wheeler with a blue trailer, and it’ll be going up I-41. He said we should try to take it by the Gardens, before it gets to Lake Forest.”

“Alright. Everyone get in. Anyone who fucks this up, pays.”

Mickey squishes into the back seat of the family car along-side Tony and Joey, and Iggy gets into the passenger seat. Terry drives, and besides the low drone of talk radio no one thinks to turn off or up, the occupants of the car remain silent, each preparing for the night inside their own heads. 

It only takes fifteen minutes to get to Manny’s garage, but every second of it is uncomfortable in the cramped back seat. The entire ride, Mickey has to work hard not to accidentally catch Terry’s eyes in the rear-view. They finally make it, and as soon as Joey’s out of the way, he pulls himself out of the car and stretches. 

Despite the ruckus of his late arrival, there’s still a few hours before they need to leave. Terry and Iggy spend it negotiating with Manny who seems to be done with his legitimate business for the day, and Mickey, Joey, and Tony play a few half-hearted games of craps at the table in the garage office while they wait. 

As the time to leave gets nearer, Mickey finds himself getting more nervous. It’s nothing to worry about, he always gets this way before a job. Especially a big one like this. It’s better not to think about it too much, not to let himself get distracted. 

Tony and Joey are starting to get jittery too, but that may be more from excitement than nerves. Their game of craps falls away as Terry calls Joey over to join the talks. Mickey is thinking about what Ian had said earlier when he catches Tony staring at him from across the table.

“That store was closed for more than an hour before you showed up.” He says. “Where were you?”

“Did I miss the part where I fucking answer to you?” Mickey snaps back, crossing his arms and leaning back in the chair to get a better view of where his father’s standing so he’ll know when it’s time to leave. 

“We used to talk, you know?” Tony says, and it’s not at all what Mickey’s expecting, but he doesn’t respond. 

After a few minutes, Joey walks back over carrying a black Model 1216. He holds it out to Mickey, but when he reaches out to take it, says ‘psych’ and pulls it back, tossing him a set of car keys instead.

“You’re driving, bitch.” 

*-*-*

Tony gets a walkie and a police scanner, and the three of them get into a lifted pickup truck that’s so high off the ground Mickey feels like a child pulling himself into the driver’s seat. It’s been painted a custom electric blue and there’s a line of flood lights on the roof, black to match the mesh grill and headache rack. Mickey’s never driven anything this tall before - in the driver’s seat it feels like he’s looking down at the floor of the garage from at least ten feet up - but once he’s adjusted the seat so his feet can reach the pedals, he doesn’t think it will be too hard to get the hang of. Thankfully it’s an automatic; he doesn’t want to think about the ribbing he’d get if he had to switch places with Joey just because he doesn’t know how to drive a stick. Just in front of their truck, Terry and Iggy are getting into an all-black Hummer with tinted windows so dark, he can’t see any hint of movement inside once the doors are closed. 

Iggy checks in on the walkie, then both the cars rumble to life and pull out of the garage. 

Mickey’s glad they have the streets of the city for him to get used to the truck. Terry takes it slow as they weave their way through the sparse, late-night traffic, and by the time the buildings start to fall away into more industrial areas, he’s more or less got the hang of it. About five minutes out of the garage, Joey pulls a cd case out of his jacket and leans over the center console to put the disk in. Mickey recognizes the tan cover of License to Ill immediately and they drive north with the speakers blaring, the taillights of Terry’s Hummer always just a few car lengths in front of them. 

It’s twenty past midnight when they pull onto the interstate. She’s Crafty is playing through the speakers, making the car rattle with bass, and Mickey and his brother’s are singing along. They know all the words, have since they were kids, and alternate rapping verses never missing a beat. The night is clear, traffic almost non-existent, and - besides the shotgun on Joey’s lap - they might as well be three brothers going out for a night of cruisin’. They’re going eighty now, weaving in and out of the few other cars, and Mickey’s doing his best just to keep up with Terry who’s been pulling ahead little by little for the past few minutes. 

They don’t hear the static over the walkie at first, but Joey notices the red dot turn blue and turns the music down so they can hear. It’s Iggy’s voice, saying they’ve spotted the truck, and as soon as Mickey hears it, he sees it too. Ahead of them on the interstate, just on the horizon. Tony starts fiddling with the police scanner to make sure they’re all clear. 

Mickey speeds up and Terry slows down, and they switch positions because he’s going to be the one getting out ahead, using the electric blue pickup as a blockade to get the sixteen-wheeler’s driver to pull over. 

His heart starts pounding now. All the nerves that had settled as he got used to the truck’s controls and height are coming back alive again, acting as though he is in imminent danger. As if his body is a better judge of what he should and shouldn’t do than his mind. 

They hang back for another minute until Tony gives the all clear, then Mickey really starts to speed up so he can catch up to the semi. He changes lanes going almost ninety to get around a minivan, then swerves back in front of them. The car lets out a pitiful honk as he passes, but Joey’s turned the stereo back up and Mickey barely hears it. 

He’s so focused on what he’s doing now, it’s hard to hear anything at all. 

The different directions of the interstate here are separated by a grassy median, and on this side there are three lanes for traffic and a breakdown lane on the left. The semi is in the middle lane, but there are other cars, most doing no more than seventy, on either side, and Mickey’s going to have to get around them if he wants to get out in front. Joey rolls down the back windows, getting ready, and Mickey comes up on the first car in the left lane, fast. He edges into the breakdown lane where, at this speed, the loose pebbles and various bits of trash the daily traffic sweeps over make the tires more prone to slipping and the wheel looser in his hands. The truck is made for off-roading and can handle the dirty pavement, but he’s pushing the upper limits of its speed as they pass the car and he pulls back into the left lane. Another honk, but now Mickey can get into the middle lane himself, with the sixteen-wheeler just behind, and wait for Terry to get into position. He slows down to sixty and closes the distance between the back of his truck and the semi so no other cars can get between him.

_ That was the hard part,  _ he tells his shaky hands, but he’s not so sure about that. It’s not over til it’s over, but now he can hear the music again and, in the side-view mirror, he watches the black Hummer pull up beside the semi on the right. On his left, the car he passed earlier zooms by with another honk but Mickey has bigger things to think about. 

The lane to their left is clear now, and Joey calls it: telling him to slow down. Mickey does, slowly. First to fifty-five, then fifty, then forty-five, and now the semi is right on his ass, but he and Terry are controlling the traffic on this stretch of interstate for the moment. After a minute of riding his tail and Mickey still not speeding up, the semi flashes its turn signal and gets into the left lane to try and get around him, but the second he does, Mickey and Terry both change lanes as well, boxing it in again. 

Now there’s nowhere left for the semi to go. Joey tells him to slow down again, but Mickey hesitates. He has no idea what will happen if the truck driver decides ‘fuck it’ and just rear-ends them going this speed, and his feet at least are unwilling to hit the breaks again to find out. Through the open windows, the truck’s bellowing horn rings out, and Joey yells at him again to slow down. Finally, he does. Pressing down on the breaks until they’re going thirty, and instead of ramming into the back of his truck or attempting to side-swipe Terry, the semi slows down as well. Now Joey’s hanging out the back window, brandishing the shotgun and waving it in a ‘pull-over’ motion. In the side view mirror, Mickey can see Iggy hanging out of the Hummer, doing the exact same thing. 

He slows down a little more, and now the cars still on the road, not connected to what they’re doing, are all speeding by on the right with the occasional blaring honk. It’s just a matter of time before one of them calls the cops, if the driver hasn’t already, and now there’s an invisible stopwatch counting down whether this job will be successful, or if it’ll be a one-way ticket to prison for the Milkovich boys tonight. 

He keeps slowing down and sees the moment when the driver gives up, puts on his turn signal for no one, and pulls over into the breakdown lane, bringing the semi to a stop. Mickey pulls over too, and the second the car stops, Joey jumps out and walks along the grassy median to the cab of the semi. 

He watches through the side mirror as Joey boosts himself up on the side step and wrenches the door to the semi’s cab open. For one horrible second, Mickey sees the muzzle flare and thinks the driver has fired on Joey, but then reality reasserts itself and he watches his brother in the mirror, pulling a corpse instead of a man out of the seat and taking its place. The limp body of the driver lays on the grass of the median, nothing but a lump in the dark.

He stares into the side mirror as Terry’s Hummer takes off first, then the semi with Joey behind the wheel. Tony punches him hard in the arm and tells him to ‘fucking get going’, and Mickey puts on his own turn signal and merges back into the left lane. 

_ What time is it? _

“It’s time to get ill!” Tony answers triumphantly, but Mickey isn’t in the mood to sing anymore. 

*-*-*

Less than thirty minutes later, they’re behind a chain link fence topped with razor wire in a junkyard owned by the bikers who set this whole thing up. Rows of totalled cars, some already crushed and some still waiting for their turn, sit among the piles of dirt, scrap metal, and various other trash. Mickey parks the truck next to a pile of old refrigerators with their doors torn off and lowers his feet onto the ground. Joey’s also dropping out of the semi’s cab while a few of the men from the scrapyard pull large, tan tarps over the stolen truck and trailer.

Tony goes to join Joey over by the Hummer, and Mickey follows behind him rather than be left alone. 

The only building on the site is a cramped work trailer, and while Terry and the two oldest men with the longest beards go inside to finish up the deal, Mickey and his brothers stand around a pit fire outside with the other young guys. Bottled beer from a red cooler is passed around and everyone is smiling and talking excitedly. It sounds like a good score, and they’re all going home with full pockets tonight. 

One of the bikers takes the police scanner from Tony, and everyone waits while he fiddles with it until the static clears. They all listen to local police and state troopers talk on their own CB’s and coordinate the search for them. There’s already a description out for the cars he and Terry were driving, but they’re on private property now, far back from the main roads, and the cop’s search will be for nothing. 

Even Mickey finds it amusing, and when he laughs along with the other guys, it’s genuine. 

They talk and celebrate and drink, and above their heads are the kinds of numerous stars you just can’t see in the city. 

The bright orange flames of the fire flicker in front of them, and Mickey wouldn’t mind it if Ian was here - working for  _ him  _ for once instead of the other way around - but Gallagher is safe at home. Probably asleep in his bed now exactly where he should be. Mickey will just have to settle for the company of his brothers and these strangers, and try not to think too hard about how the fire reminds him of the color of Ian’s hair during sunsets. 

When Terry’s done negotiating and comes out of the trailer, everyone gets their cut. First Iggy, then Joey, then Tony, but when it’s Mickey’s turn, Terry just puts a hand on his shoulder and leads him away from the fire while everyone watches. The conversation continues as they walk towards the junk and away from the light of the fire, but now it’s a low murmur so different from the excited chatter before. 

He’d gladly give up his cut for the chance to just go home right now, hates the way he feels like a young child who’s about to be scolded in front of the other kids, but it doesn’t work that way. He lets Terry lead him just out of earshot of the other guys and stares at the ground, waiting. 

“You were late today.” Terry says, now squeezing Mickey’s arm instead of holding it. Less than an hour ago he watched his older brother shoot a man in the face and - if he had to bet on it - he would guess not a single man standing by the fire would intervene now, no matter what Terry decides to do. 

He nods, still looking towards the dirt, but it’s not enough for Terry who gives him a hard shake that would have made his head snap back if he hadn’t braced himself. 

“Yeah.” He says more firmly, and picks a spot on Terry’s shirt to stare at instead of the ground. 

“Something more important out there than your family, son?”

“No.”

“Need me to remind you of that?”

Terry’s hand tightens painfully, and the only answer Mickey can give is to shake his head. 

“Your brother’s are counting on you. Your sister…” His father lets out a sigh that doesn’t sound angry at all, and Mickey finally finds the courage to look him in the eye. “You’re not a child anymore.”

Mickey looks at Terry and knows he’s right.

“Yes, sir.”

They continue to look at each other, communicating silently, and Terry releases Mickey’s arm. He holds out a few folded over bills, but when Mickey goes to take them, Terry doesn’t let go. They each hold the money and stare in the faint light of the fire.

“You’re a man now, and you’re going to act like it.”

Mickey nods and Terry lets go. 

He almost pockets the money immediately, but makes a spur of the moment decision to count it instead. Because that’s what Terry would do.

There’s fifteen hundred in crisp hundred dollar bills, more than he’s ever made in a single night, or week for that matter, and he puts it in his pockets next to his cigarettes. 

Terry doesn’t pat him on the back, doesn’t take him by the arm. Just turns around and walks back to the fire where everyone is waiting for them. After a few seconds, Mickey follows. 

They leave the cars they came in at the junkyard, along with the semi, and take a van the bikers brought with them back to Manny’s instead. Mickey doesn’t realize how sore he is from the day - headbutting that old dude, Ian punching him, Terry grabbing his arm, shaking him - until he’s shoved in the backseat of the car again between Tony and Joey.

Almost all of the adrenaline from earlier has worn off of them, and the car is quiet most of the drive. When they finally get to the house, Mickey goes right to bed and falls asleep less than ten minutes after his head hits the pillow.

*-*-*


	4. Kiss Me, Fuck Me, Stay the Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mickey helps Ian rob Ned and they both pay the price. Then he invites Ian over for night of R&R at the Milkovich house

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew, what a week. I just need to catch up on all the hours of sleep I lost since last Tuesday then I'll be ready to celebrate. My brain is so fried I don't even know what to say about this chapter -_- It ends with Ian and Mickey falling asleep together so nothing bad here. Enjoy

Season 3; Chapter 4: Kiss Me, Fuck Me, Stay the Night

His stash of money keeps growing until affording a place of his own doesn’t seem so crazy. He and Ian continue hooking up at work and hanging out after, or vice versa depending on what mood they’re in. Mickey turns eighteen on a Thursday, and doesn’t realize it. Mandy doesn’t come home. 

Mickey works, then he  _ works _ , then he sleeps and does it all over again. 

As the summer hits full swing, he wakes up in his bed sometime around two in the afternoon after a night of selling molly at the club. His feet are still sore and his breath is dank with the taste of stale liquor, but he forces himself to get up anyways. Saturday’s he’s supposed to open with Ian, and he’s missed just about his entire shift now. Still, he gets up. If he’s lucky he can catch the redhead before he closes the shop, and they can hang out at one of their favorite spots. 

Ian is only just closing up when he gets there, and doesn’t even bother giving him shit for not showing up anymore. They talk about family as they walk, but five minutes into the conversation Mickey doesn’t want to hear anymore. 

“She’s your half-sister. Don’t you care?” Ian asks about a girl Mickey only remembers through the apocalyptic fights her birth had caused between his own mother and Terry. 

“Why the fuck should I? I don’t know her. She’s not my sister.”

“She  _ is  _ your sister, and that’s not the point. Don’t you feel anything for someone whose mother is dead, her father is a shithead, and she’s scared and all alone, Mick?”

“And what the fuck am I supposed to do about that?” They’ve gotten to the hole in the chain link but neither of them go through yet. “ _ I’m  _ trying to save up...look I- I can’t take care of her and neither can Mandy. She should just let Terry figure it out.”

He’s about to go through the fence after he finishes talking, but Ian grabs his shirt and holds him back. He doesn’t say anything, but he looks at Mickey like he’s trying to read his face: the way someone will when they’re trying to decide if you’re lying or not. 

“She can’t stay with Terry.” Ian says, still looking at him closely. 

“Why not?” But Mickey already knows why not. Because Ian, just like every other poor sack of shit in their neighborhood, still thinks he’s better than the Milkovich’s. That Mickey’s family is worse just because none of them have graduated high school, like Lip is going to, and that rather than showing up once a year to ruin their lives, his mother is just gone. It’s not even concern, it’s pity. Pity that Mickey and Mandy had to grow up the way they did, and now Ian’s looking him right in the eye and saying he wouldn’t wish Mickey’s childhood on anyone. It’s bullshit. 

“Did you talk to Mandy while you were in Juvie?” Ian lets go of his shirt but doesn’t look away, and Mickey feels compelled to stare right back. 

“A little. Mostly she just sent me shit in the mail.”

He thinks Ian is going somewhere with this, that he’s just one link away from connecting all the dots and figuring out what any of this has to do with some half-sister he’s never met, and he’s holding out judgment on whether or not to get mad until he does, but then something in Ian’s expression changes. It goes from scrutinizing and confrontational to cool and composed in a second. A smile spreads across Ian’s features, and Mickey only knows it’s fake because he saw the transformation happen. 

“You know what? You’re right.” Ian says in a voice Mickey recognizes as the one he uses to talk to customers at the store. “Let Lip and Mandy take care of it. It’s no big deal. C’mon, let’s go before someone sees us.” 

It’s what he wanted all along, but now Ian’s sudden casualness is making him reluctant to drop the conversation. 

“What the fuck, Gallagher? Five seconds ago the Milkovich’s aren’t good enough for the precious girl, and now you don’t give a shit.”

“Just forget I said anything. It’s not our problem.” Ian says climbing through the hole in the fence and standing back to give Mickey room to do the same. 

“Then why’d you bring it up?” He asks, but Ian’s already walking away and he has to do a little jog to keep up. 

“Just let it go. Come on, I want to do a few runs through the course before it gets dark.”

*-*-*

It’s not the conversation about his half-sister that keeps him up that night, even though he still feels a vague sense of unease about how Ian suddenly decided to drop it, and it isn’t the fact that Gallagher brought up that wrinkled ATM machine he’s  _ still _ fucking either. 

_ He isn’t afraid to kiss me _

That’s what Ian had said about the old man when Mickey asked. They had been at the obstacle course, spending the afternoon in the same way they did most days now, when Ian decided to bring him up again. Mickey had hoped his beatdown would keep the guy away, but he underestimated the draw of Ian Gallagher. It’s a mistake he’s made before.

And when Mickey asked, it wasn’t money, or looks, his career, or any of the other things he can’t control that Ian claimed is the reason he chooses to spend his nights with a guy old enough to be their grandfather. 

It’s kissing.

Kissing Ian.

Mickey’s only ever kissed two people in his life: his mother, who continued to give him kisses on his cheek until she passed away, and-

_ Afraid to kiss me _

Mickey’s not afraid. Sure, there’s another memory buried somewhere deep, under years and years of not thinking about it, but that’s not fear. Mickey would just not think about it when his mother leaned in to kiss him, and he would not think about it when the hero of the movie would pull a woman in close and give her a passionate kiss, and he’s definitely Not Thinking About It right now, in his living room, while his cousin lays out a basic plan to rob this guy’s house tomorrow. 

_ Afraid _

He’s not. He just doesn’t have a word for the revulsion he feels at the idea of kissing, can’t possibly put into words what could go wrong because he Doesn’t Think About That and that’s all there is to say. 

He gives Iggy the address, and instead of the paper maps his father is partial to, his brother brings out a laptop and they get to see a picture of the house that looks like it was taken right from the street outside. No leg-work needed to case the place. Everyone else in the room seems comfortable with the technology, so Mickey doesn’t mention how incredible it is for fear of sounding stupid. 

Iggy has to make some calls about getting a van big enough to fit all the stuff that fucker promised would be there to steal, and he goes out on the porch to do it. Mickey watches silently as his cousin works at the laptop, dragging the image along until he can get a better view of the arched entry. 

He could be thinking about anything. About the job, about the weed in his nightstand, about the new Grand Theft Auto coming out next week he and Ian have already planned to steal. 

He’s not thinking about any of those things.

He’s thinking about the year Terry left for a job down south, and his mother had taken Mandy -  _ just  _ Mandy - to stay with her sister and left Mickey, Tony, and their cousin Sandy to be unceremoniously picked up by CPS. That’s when they were taken to the group home - which still stands, though it’s not in use anymore, just a few blocks from where he’s sitting now - for the worst year of his life. A year he spent the rest of his childhood afraid he might have to repeat. Except now… well, now he doesn’t have to worry about that any more.

“What are you smiling about?” His cousin asks, giving him a weird look.

“Nothing.” Mickey says with a shrug. “Realized I’m eighteen.” 

“Congratulations. Now, pay attention.” 

They go over the plan again. Really just drive up, get the stuff, drive off. Don't get caught. Then Iggy gets off the phone and says they have a van lined up. After that, there’s not much else to discuss, and Mickey goes to his room to smoke in solitude. Skipping the promise of food for the chance to be alone. 

He smoked weed a lot before Juvie, especially on the days he went to school, but he’s cut back lately. Too much time spent working and not enough left to just relax and let his mind wander. Tonight, though, he’s got nothing but time. He rolls himself three joints, picks the best one to start with, and lights up, closing the door and window so the room can fill with smoke.

He’s eighteen now. Eighteen. There’s no more group homes, no more school, no more Juvie. He really is a man. He could vote if he wanted to, or...well, he can’t think of anything else right now, but still, eighteen. 

“Happy birthday.” He says in a high-pitched, cartoonish voice, pretending the well-wishes are from the smoldering joint in his hand, and it makes him laugh. 

If only he had turned fifty. Then Ian might be satisfied and stop dating other men. That’s not the only issue, of course, Ian also wants money and class and the finer things in life and-

_ Not afraid _

That one other thing that maybe Mickey can actually give him. That would probably mean thinking about it, but would that really be so awful? Especially now that CPS can never take him again, no matter how bad Terry gets. 

And now that Ian’s said it, it’s hard to get it out of his mind: that he might actually be afraid. Afraid to kiss him. So afraid he’d rather let Ian get all the good things in life from someone else than just manning up and doing this one thing.

There’s nothing to be afraid of now. No kids waiting to beat him up under the bed or behind the curtains. He has a loaded glock sitting on his nightstand. He’s safe.

So he’s going to think about it. If he can even remember. But what’s the point of lying to himself, here, when he’s all alone? 

He remembers.

He takes a long drag on the joint, holds it in as long as he can, and lets it out slow. 

It had been a note to start. Passed to him by one of the cooler boys in the home - Mickey’s age, but he had been there much longer - and now Mickey doesn’t remember what it said, but he remembers how it made him feel. Whatever it said, something along the lines of ‘you’re cute. I like you. Let’s hang out.’ It had given him his first excited taste of mutual attraction; it had made him feel special. 

Now all of those feelings are soaked in bitterness, but back then they had been new and terrifyingly real. 

He had hung out with the boy. Twice at least, but maybe there were other times he’s not remembering. He remembers the rail yard, where they collected bottle shards and walked along the tracks and even held hands for a little while, and the night they had sneaked out of bed just so they could sit on the porch and talk. 

As uncomfortable as remembering all this is, the more he thinks about, the easier it gets. He no longer thinks that kid was cool, no longer hates himself just for talking to him like he had for so many years. 

The worst part is thinking about how much effort the boys had put into it. Into exposing little Mickey Milkovich. Maybe he should be flattered, but it just makes him feel kind of ill. How could they have tricked him so completely, and why? Just to prove that he was a fag? Mickey had been so young, so new to the idea of fooling around at all, he had only the most basic notion that kissing other boys would even be considered bad. Any one of them could have given his dick a few tugs, and asked if it felt nice. The answer would have been a resounding yes. 

But that’s not what they wanted. No, they had wanted him emotionally invested too because  _ that’s  _ the part that makes you a fag, and that’s the part Mickey had fallen hard for. Just like a sucker.

Even now, stoned and alone in his room six years later, it’s easier to remember the way they had all come out at the end and laughed, or the beating that had followed, or even the six months of daily teasing that had followed  _ that _ until Terry finally picked them up. It’s easier to remember all of that than the two weeks that led up to it. 

There’s something that just sucks, thinking of his younger self, stupid and naive but just as much of a sarcastic shit as he is now, getting excited by a child’s idea of romance.

Twelve year-old Mickey had fallen for the whole thing hook-line-and-sinker, and he enjoyed every heart pounding second of it right up to the last. So what if everything that fucking kid said had been a lie? When he had placed that kiss on Mickey’s lips, had he really been faking? Maybe he had wished the other boys weren’t there too so they could have done more than just that one kiss. 

He’s stretched out on his bed now, relaxed, flat on his back and staring up at the ceiling. His second joint is burning its way down to his fingers, but he doesn’t notice. 

Yes, it had felt nice to talk to someone, and more than nice to hold his hand, but he’s felt all those things since then, with Ian. It’s better too, not just because Ian’s better than that nameless, faceless boy, but because they’ve had actual time together, almost two years. He can, and does, trust Ian. 

He had kissed that boy in the moonlight, next to the ping-pong table with its broken paddles, and for a single, shining second little Mickey Milkovich had been both gay  _ and  _ happy. Then, almost immediately after he got his first real taste of someone else's lips, the other two boys came out from their hiding spots and the one who had been flirting with him - the bait, really - was still smiling, but no longer looked nervous like Mickey felt. His smile had turned cruel, and he threw the first punch. Not the first punch that had ever connected with Mickey’s face, far from it, but it was the first one Mickey had ever taken for being a  _ fag _ , and he never forgot it. Even when he wasn’t thinking about it.

Now Ian, who’s hit Mickey plenty of times but never hurt him like that, wants to kiss. And what of it? Mickey’s not twelve anymore; he’s not afraid of a fight. Even one where he’s outnumbered. Hell, he has half a mind to go to the Gallagher’s right now, throw rocks at his window until he comes out, and the two of them can stand under the moonlight and-

But the same weed that made it easier to remember is now making it impossible to move. His arms and legs are heavy, his mind so relaxed the uneven plaster of the ceiling could be art the way it draws his eyes and holds his attention. He’s not going anywhere tonight, but Ian will still be there, waiting for him, tomorrow. And tomorrow, anything could happen. 

*-*-*

_ Why am I so fucking stupid _

Two years. He’s had two whole years full of opportunities to kiss Gallagher, and he’s wasted every single one. 

Now they can’t get a moment to themselves. Iggy has been raring to go since the moment Mickey rolled out of bed, and by the time Ian shows up, he doesn’t give them a second to say hi before he’s pushing everyone into the van. 

He gives the keys to Ian, who’s only here to act as a spotter and getaway driver, and the rest of them get into the back with the guns and mover’s straps. 

It’s a long drive out, but every time he gets the chance to talk to Ian he can feel Iggy’s eyes on them. The more he thinks about it, the more the words get lost in his head, and even the neutral conversations they  _ can _ have dry up quickly or come to awkward, unnatural ends when Mickey realizes he and Ian are the only ones talking.

And Gallagher looks so  _ good.  _ Working with Mickey - real work - driving the getaway van for a job. It’s like a fantasy Mickey didn’t know he had until it happened. He’s got all the regular jitters of doing a job like this, but with Ian here there’s more excitement than nerves. 

It’s stupid and reckless and he  _ knows _ he shouldn’t, but does it anyway. The second the guys are out of sight, too eager to get to work now to wait for him, Mickey takes the first chance he’s had all day, hops back into the van, leans over the seat, and kisses Ian. Just before, in the seconds between turning back around and finding Ian’s lips with his own, he has the thought that maybe it won’t feel good. That maybe after all this time being comfortable with Ian, this one thing will set him back; will make his skin crawl and his stomach clench uncomfortably the same way being near anyone else does. 

His fears are baseless. It does exactly the opposite: when he steps back out of the van, he’s feet feel lighter, his mind emptier in the best kind of way, and it only adds to the feeling that he’s been so stupid waiting this long. There’s no regret; only a fluttery kind of excitement inside his chest. If he lives a thousand more years, what else could he possibly experience that would compare to the way his heart is racing right now? Already, he wants to do it again. 

The thought makes him flip Gallagher off, because he’s pretty sure Ian’s known that this whole time, and, like usual, it’s Mickey who’s had to catch up. 

He has to focus though, or at the very least pretend to. This is a job and they’re supposed to find a few specific things as well as grabbing all the furniture and artwork they can carry. He goes straight to the wine cellar while the other two start rolling up rugs. The door to it is in the corner of the kitchen, exactly like Ned had told Ian, and takes the steps two at a time. He probably should have let Iggy do this part; his brother can identify a few bottles that will fetch a high price on the underground market just by their labels, and Ned has quite the selection to choose from. At least Mickey knows exactly what he’s looking for: displayed on the top of one of the wooden racks, label facing out, is one that, to Mickey, looks indistinguishable from the rest of the cheap champagne they sell at the Kash-and-Grab. He checks the date though and it’s right, so he grabs it, along with a few other bottles he pulls at random and brings them upstairs. 

The van is already starting to fill up, and Ian is moving things around to make them fit. Next, it’s paintings, rugs, anything that’s wood and heavy and not nailed down. 

If there really is an old lady upstairs, she doesn’t stir. 

The yard is filling up, and he and Iggy go in for another load. Mickey has a brief thought that the woman isn’t home, or if she is, she might just be dead up there. If Terry had been there and seen his son relax halfway through a job, he would have given Mickey the smack to the head he deserved; they haven’t even made it out the door yet. Except Terry isn’t here, and Mickey spots a large grandfather clock by the door they’ve overlooked. It’s all dark wood and glittering crystal, and must be worth a grand at least, but the thing weighs twice as much as he thought, and it falls over onto Iggy with a clang that could wake the whole neighborhood. 

_ Shit _

The old lady’s not dead. She’s standing at the top of the stairs with a shotgun, and Mickey’s glad later that Ian didn’t let him bring any guns because he’s so startled and full of adrenaline in the moment, he might have actually shot her. As it is, they have no choice but to run and the old lady shoots him instead, right in the ass, and that’s the second time he’s gotten shot because of one of Ian’s lovers. 

But who’s counting?

_ Shit. Shit. _

They make it to the van and drive off, leaving everything else behind on the lawn. Ian peels out onto the quiet neighborhood street, but seems more interested in telling Mickey he got shot than driving. 

“I know I got shot!” Mickey just wants Ian to look where he’s going, and wants his brother to- “Stop touching it!”

“It’s just birdshot, lil’ Mick, you’ll live.”

He can’t see the wound, and is more interested in making sure Ian’s watching the road anyway, but he can tell he’ll live. There’s no feeling of blood pooling at his feet, no light headedness. What it really feels like is that he did a bad trick on a skateboard and ended up scraping his ass on the pavement. Even the soreness in his spine feels like nothing more than a rough impact. 

“Someone’s going to have to take these out.” His cousin says, sounding more sober than Iggy. “You doing okay, cuz?”

“Yeah, Just fucking great. Thanks.”

“I know someone.” Ian says and starts digging around in his pockets, holding the wheel in one hand. “Here, call Ned. He’s in there under Lloyd.” He hands over his cell to Mickey who takes it but doesn’t dial anything. 

“Ned’s a doctor?”

“The fuck does it matter who it is, Mickey? You got shot! Just tell him to meet us at my place. He knows where it is.”

There’s a lot to unpack in those few sentences, but his butt, rather than feeling slowly better like a scrape might, is stinging worse with each bump in the road. They aren’t alone in the car either, so Mickey’s not going to interrogate Ian about ‘Lloyd’ now. He finds the number and dials it as Ian drives them away from the gated communities and onto the busier streets that will take them home. 

He puts the phone on speaker, holding it out so Ian can talk into it, and everyone falls silent as it rings.

“Ian?”

“Ned, listen-”

“Is it done?”

Mickey’s really starting to hate this fucker’s soft, condescending voice. 

“Shut the fuck up and listen, you old fuck!” He yells into the receiver even though it makes Ian frown. 

“Mickey got shot, Ned. We need your help.”

“Who shot him?”

“Your fucking wife shot me, dick-breath!”

“Mickey, shut the fuck up and let me talk.”

He does shut up, and keeps holding the phone out so Ian can make plans to meet Ned at his house and get Mickey fixed up. The van can go to Manny’s garage until they figure out what to do with it. When the call ends, there’s nothing left to do except let Ian drive them back to the Yards doing a speed halfway between panicking and not wanting to get pulled over.

When the phone call is done, Mickey pulls himself into the back where he can kneel and lean against the wall. The distance between him and the front seat is good because Ian keeps looking at him like he’s going to say something dumb despite the other two guys in the back. Iggy’s moving stuff around and already making plans for what he’s going to do with what they did manage to steal. 

The pain continues to spread rather than abate until the leg below where the pellets hit begins to feel stiff and achy as well. By the time they finally get to the Gallaghers, Ian suggests they carry him and Mickey doesn’t protest even though being grabbed under his legs brings out a fresher, more intense pain. Now he  _ can _ feel blood dripping down his pant leg.

Iggy drives away with the van, and none of them notice the extra car parked on the street by the empty lot. 

Inside, it’s a madhouse. Ian’s told stories about his family before, but somehow this is not what Mickey was picturing; it’s like a frat party for children in here. No one stops them as Mickey gets manhandled into the kitchen, and Ian clears off the counter so he can bend over it. 

The pain is definitely worse now, shooting up his leg any time he puts weight on it. That and the fact he beat up the only doctor around less than two weeks ago, tells Mickey this isn’t going to be a pleasant experience. 

After Ned digs out the first two pellets, Mickey’s sarcastic comments dry up. He wants this to be done -  _ now -  _ but every time he adjusts even a little to try and make himself more comfortable, Ned tells him to stop squirming. Then, even worse, Ian will repeat it in a softer tone as though Mickey needs to be soothed. If he wasn’t stuck, bent over this counter, in this house where their impromptu surgery isn’t even the loudest thing going on, he’d be in the perfect mood to hit someone. Gramps slaps his ass as though they aren’t both being fucked by the same skinny redhead, and Mickey knows exactly who he’s going to kick the shit out of just as soon as his leg can hold his weight again. 

The chaos of the house at least makes its own kind of sense. All the children are clustered around the tv in the living room. The kitchen is theirs to use for rags and bandages and the tools Ned either needs or is pretending to need just so he can drag this torture out for as long as possible. It’s chaotic, but in a good way. Everyone who’s here, belongs here. 

Until the woman from CPS shows up. It’s like a kick in the gut to everyone present. Even Mickey’s cousin looks uncomfortable, and he doesn’t have any kids. She’s a fox in a hen house - or something else, equally disruptive - and Mickey would sooner go up against that crazy broad with the shotgun again than see the look on Fiona’s face when she realizes what’s going on. 

Eighteen or not, this might actually be some sort of cosmic punishment for kissing Ian, for not assuming -  _ remembering _ \- that things can always get worse. 

Fortunately, Ned is braver than Mickey’s given him credit for. He sticks around and silently pulls the last pellet out and bandages the whole thing up while the underage boy he’s been fucking states his name and date of birth to a state employee less than six feet away. All of his info will be included in the woman's report, along with that of the young girl who came in screaming about drowning other kids at the community pool. 

Most of the kids here aren’t Gallaghers, but the ones that are, are in deep shit. 

Ned gives him whispered instructions that basically boil down to change the dressings and keep it clean. Then he disappears silently through the back door, medical case in hand, without even a glance at Ian whose too occupied trying to help his older sister sort out the kids to notice. 

It’s clear from the CPS worker’s tone, there will be no bargaining with her. Around the time the local anesthetic finally starts to kick in for Mickey, she starts citing specific laws over Fiona’s loud objections. 

At least he can pull his pants up now. 

He and his cousin do a quick sweep of the kitchen, gathering up anything with blood on it and tossing it all into a trash bag Ian tosses out the back door. 

The woman finally notices Mickey.

“Are you related to any of the children here? I need to take down both your information as well.” She says, pointing to his cousin too. Before either of them can answer, Fiona is there, literally pushing him towards the back door.

“Mickey doesn’t live here. He’s leaving right now.” She says at the same time one of the kids in the living room calls out, ‘That’s my brother, Mickey!’ but he’s on the back porch before he gets a chance to see who said that.

Ian gives him a brief glance before the door closes behind him, but it would have been better if he hadn’t because Gallagher is on the verge of tears, and Mickey hasn’t even had a chance to figure out how much of this is his fault yet. 

There’s nothing to do but limp back home with the help of his cousin. Iggy’s still not back when they get there, but Joey’s home. When he sees the state Mickey’s in, he goes into his bedroom and comes back out with a couple of pills. Mickey’s not sure what they are, but it doesn’t matter because as soon as he takes them, he goes to lay face-down in bed. Ten disorienting minutes later, he’s out cold. 

*-*-*

When he wakes up, it’s pitch black outside. His butt and leg are a throbbing chorus of agony, and he has to piss so badly it’s a miracle he didn’t just wet the bed in his sleep. He briefly considers doing that anyway, to avoid what is sure to be a hellish trip to the toilet, but then he’d just have to lay in it and, worse, take his soiled sheets to the laundromat. So he gets up, careful not to put much weight on the right side, and hobbles to the toilet.

Shitting is going to be absolute misery, but that’s a problem for another time. 

Right now, he wants to change his bandages, find a pair of pants that aren’t covered in blood and bullet holes, take something for the pain that won’t knock him out, and find Ian - hopefully safe at home where he should be. In that order.

The bandages don’t want to peel away from his skin easily. Every time they get caught on one of the pellet holes, the pain makes his hands shake and he has to stop and breathe a few times before he can continue. He gives up less than halfway through and starts rummaging around in the medicine cabinet instead, but all of the bottles look the same and he has no idea what any of them do. The instructions he can read-  _ take 2...after...don’t mix  _ \- are as unhelpful as the long and indecipherable names. He remembers what the pills they gave him for the first bullet wound in his leg had looked like. One had been round and white, another small, oval and blue, and he kind of remembers one they gave him at the beginning that had been difficult to swallow and also maybe blue. He thinks he’ll probably be able to pick out the right ones just by looking at them, and, if not, fuck it. He’ll take a few either way. Standing is becoming so painful he doesn’t really care anymore. 

“ _ Shit _ , Mickey, what the fuck happened to you?”

He’s at the sink with his pants and boxers around his knees, bloody bandages still clinging to his ass cheek, and a handful of assorted pills he’s contemplating just taking. Mandy’s watching him from the doorway looking almost as bad as he feels with her hair an un-brushed rat’s nest and her eyes puffy and red from crying. 

“Got shot by an old lady. The fuck happened to you?”

“Lip’s gone. CPS took all of them. Guess I’m staying here again.”

“Where’d they take ‘em?”

“Fuck. I don’t know.” She says and wipes her runny nose on her sleeve. “Want some help with that?”

Mickey looks at her for a second, then holds out the bottles in his hands. “I don’t know which ones to take.”

“Okay, I’ll figure it out. Just, get out for a second so I can pee.”

He does, and when Mandy comes back into his room she has two pill bottles in her hand. The one with an orange cap she tells him to take all week so it doesn’t get infected -and to ‘clear up whatever else you might have’ she says, but he ignores that part - and the one with the white cap is just for the pain. 

“Will they put me to sleep?” He asks. 

“I don’t know. Probably not. You’re not supposed to drive or drink when you take them, but they all say that. Now turn around and let's get this over with.”

She helps him change the dressing and clean everything even though she complains the whole time. The work keeping her hands busy and Mickey’s lack of desire to interrupt - or even respond most of the time - seems to draw her out of the distress she was feeling when she first came in. She tells him that Iggy was asking for him earlier, and that Angie asks her about him sometimes at school, that she’s worried about Lip and wants to follow him when he goes to college, and - on a tangent related to the previous comment - tells him Ian’s mother had tried to help him enlist last year, but couldn’t because he was too young.

“That’s why he doesn’t want to come with me and Lip. Because he thinks he’ll graduate high school and the army will magically solve all his problems.” She finished bandaging Mickey up almost five minutes ago, and now she’s sitting on his couch, smoking from a bong she brought from her room, and still talking. He’s laying, chest-down, on the bed with his head turned to the side so he can look at her. 

The pain pills are kicking in and, while they might not put him to sleep, he no longer feels capable of doing anything that requires movement, or any amount of thinking.

“Thought Lip didn’t want to go to college.” He mumbles, but she just shrugs.

“He will.”

“Can’t let everyone else solve your problems, Mands. Gotta solve your own problems.”

“What the fuck do you think I’m doing? Anyways, when’s the last time you solved even one of your problems? Let alone someone else's.” She ashes the bong bowl right onto his bedroom floor, then continues talking without waiting for an answer. “How’d you get shot anyways?”

As soon as she says it, Mickey remembers the ache, but the pain is more distant now. 

“Being stupid. Listening to Ian.”

That makes Mandy smile.

“Yeah, he’s sorta out-there sometimes. He gets really into things and it’s like...being with a different person or something.” 

She looks away from him, towards the window, like she’s thinking about something. Mickey knows he should get up and find Iggy, but he’s starting to feel tired again despite the fact he woke up less than an hour ago. 

When she looks back over at him, she’s smirking. 

“You know, don’t you?” She says, “You must know by now. I told him to stay away from you, thought for sure you’d kill him if you found out. You act all tough, but you’re really just a big softie.”

Mickey slowly raises his hand, flips her the bird, and lets it fall back down to hang over the edge of the bed.

“Can I sleep in here tonight?” She asks, spreading out on the couch already like it’s a given. 

“Sure.”

Mickey lets his eyes close. Sleep. Just a few more minutes of sleep and he’ll get up and find Iggy.

He ends up dozing in and out for the next hour before finally finding the energy to get up. 

Mandy’s shut the light off and is asleep on the couch by the time he stumbles off the bed and out of the room. Iggy and Tony are playing video games in the living room, but it doesn’t look like there’s anyone else around tonight. 

“Yo, Mickey. How’s your ass?” Iggy asks when he sees him.

“Fine. Where’s the stuff?”

“Sold it. There’s your cut.” He nods towards a few rubber banded bills on the table. “For the Gallagher kid too, but I heard they all got picked up.”

“Just CPS. I’ll get it to him.” 

His brothers don’t say anything to that, but when he goes to leave, Iggy calls out: “Don’t go out like that man. You look like a fucking crime scene.”

Mickey looks down at himself, and has to agree. His shirt has several smudged, bloody handprints on it. His jeans look alright from the front, but from the back you can see the shotgun holes and more blood, now dried to a dark burgundy. There’s even dried blood under his nails and a few crusted smudges of it in the hairs of his arms. 

He grumbles in frustration and acknowledgment and makes the trek back to his room for clean clothes.

There’s no point risking Mandy’s new bandaging in the shower, but he does rinse his hair, arms, and hands in the sink. When he checks, the top drawer of his dresser is empty. The middle drawer has a few shirts and a pair of pajama bottoms, and the bottom drawer is mostly just shit from his room he hasn’t bothered to clean up: an old pillowcase, an empty box of ammo, even one of Ian’s old condom wrappers buried towards the bottom. 

He flips the light on so he can look around, but Mandy doesn’t stir. His sweater is tucked between the bed and the wall, there’s a black tank top hanging over the couch, and a ski-mask on the nightstand. No pants. Mickey knows there’s no pants, but he still looks. He knows because after Kash shot him he was down to his last pair, and when he got out of Juvie wearing the civie clothes Mandy brought him, she had reminded him several times that he needed another pair. But then he had gone back in again, and when he got out the second time there was no Mandy to remind him. So now he’s done exactly what she said he would and ruined his last pair with nothing left to replace them but fleece pajamas with little images of Bart Simpson riding his skateboard on them. 

At least she’s not awake to say ‘I told you so’.

He changes into the pajama bottoms, puts the money Iggy gave him into one of the pockets, considers, then takes another pain pill, shuts the lights off, and leaves. 

The Gallagher house is dark and quiet when Mickey passes. Wherever Ian is tonight, he’ll just have to survive without Mickey’s help. 

The whole city seems quiet as he walks down the streets, but maybe he’s just feeling a bit loopy. He passes the same number of homeless people sleeping on stoops and in alleyways as usual, but none of them ask him for anything. Cop cars pass by, some just chirping occasionally to keep the good citizens on their toes, and others speeding down the streets with their full sirens blaring. People are laughing, singing and talking in all the bars he passes but, like the pain in his leg that’s making him limp, it’s all too distant to focus on. 

He blinks a few times. He’s standing under the blinding white glare of Walmart fluorescents that never change no matter what time of day it is outside. Now that he’s here, he remembers that this is where he was heading all along. He goes straight to the clothing section where all the displays are either camo or graphics of TV shows, and finally finds a rack against the wall that’s nothing but jeans. He holds them up until he finds a size that looks right, grabs three pairs, pays cash, and changes into them right outside in one of the darker corners the street lights don’t quite reach. 

Now he has pants. 

To celebrate, he leans against a telephone pole by a crosswalk and closes his eyes. Now that he’s wearing actual pants and holding a shopping bag, a guy comes up asking for money. Mickey tells him that if he holds out his hand, he’ll piss in it for free, and gets a ‘fuck you’ for his trouble. It’s a good sign that he should get moving again. 

On his way back home, the city seems more lively. Now he can hear the music coming out of the bars, and see the neon lights advertising everything from fresh burgers to cheap beer. It’s almost too much. Especially when coupled with all the people on the sidewalks and cars on the streets. He feels claustrophobic until he gets back towards the Yards where the businesses are further apart and the sounds of late night drinking get replaced with car alarms and barking dogs. 

Despite Mandy mentioning her earlier, he hasn’t really thought of Angie since the last time he saw her. It’s odd to hear her voice in his head now, as he walks into a store with a flashing neon triple X sign out front, still carrying his bag from Walmart. 

_ It’s normal _

The guy behind the counter glances at him briefly when the bell over the door goes off, asks if he’s eighteen, and goes back to his phone when Mickey says he is. It’s a small store, and there’s no other customers inside. Towards the register there’s a selection of porn, both magazines and DVD’s, but further back there’s all sorts of items Mickey’s only ever seen in dirty movies like the ones on display. It should be more embarrassing to look at this stuff up close, but the low lighting, scratchy sound of Led Zeppelin coming through the store’s speakers, and disinterested shop clerk, all come together to put him at ease and make the displays seem more natural. 

Mickey spends less than fifteen minutes in the store, but they’re personal minutes filled with personal thoughts and, for once, the world just leaves him to it. The clerk doesn’t bother him, and he doesn’t have any questions to ask. He just looks until he’s gotten a pretty good idea. Then he picks out what he wants and pays for it at the register without a word. What is there to say to a guy who sells stuff like this all night? For that matter, what would he have to say to a guy like Mickey, who buys stuff like this in the middle of the night?

All of his purchases go into the grocery bag with his new pants, and when he gets home they go into the top drawer of his dresser. He leaves Mandy still sleeping, and goes out to the living room to play video games with his brothers even though he has to sit half-on, half-off the arm of the couch to be comfortable. 

*-*-*

The next morning, Mandy wakes him up early to tell him she got a hold of Lip, and Ian wanted her to let him know he’ll be at the store today for their shift. That gets him out of bed and moving. She disappears before he can ask for more help with his bandages though, and he has to spend the better part of half an hour doing it himself.

When it’s done, his medication taken, new pants on, he goes to the Kash-and-Grab feeling a little apprehensive and not sure what state he’s going to find Ian in. 

But Gallagher’s all smiles when he sees Mickey come in. He’s clearly exhausted, and more disheveled than usual, but still smiling. Even if it does look a little strained. 

“Are you okay?” Ian asks at the same time Mickey says, “Where have you been?” And they both answer - “Group home”, “Fine” - at the same time, and with that out of the way, Mickey leans his chest over the counter so he can rest his head in his arms. 

It’s nice to see Ian again after the way they left each other last time, but there’s only a few moments to enjoy it before his brain starts reminding him their shift will be over eventually and Ian will have to leave again. 

“Are you really alright? You got shot. I’ve been worried.” 

“Just birdshot. I’m fine.” Mickey lifts his head off the counter. “If you want I can show you.”

“That’s exactly what I was thinking.” Ian says and his smile gets wider. 

They lock up all the doors and put the sign up, but when they get to the cooler, Ian actually does just want to look at where Mickey got shot. 

“Who did these bandages?” He asks, touching them gingerly. “They’re really bad.”

“Fuck off. I did them myself.” This isn’t really what he expected when he took his pants off. 

“I’m gonna fix them…” Ian slowly peels back the dressing and lets out a soft gasp when he sees what’s below. The bruises make everything look worse than it actually is. 

“Does it hurt?” He asks as he pulls off the rest of the bandaging.

“Oxy helps.” Mickey says with a shrug, talking down to where Ian’s on his knees. It’s true. He’s barely feeling any pain now, and what pain there is, doesn’t bother him. He feels a little lightheaded like he had last night, and sometimes, like with the walk from home to here, time seems to skip forward a little. Other than that, it doesn’t feel much different from being high. He had forgotten how nice it was, feeling like this pretty much around the clock, before they had cut him off in Juvie. 

Ian goes up front and gets what he needs, and Mickey waits around cupping his dick and balls in both hands because it’s starting to get a little cold just standing here. It doesn’t take long before he comes back with the bandages, a bottle of hydrogen peroxide, and some rags meant to wipe down cars the shop sells in packs of two. He pours the peroxide out onto one of the rags then softly dabs it against Mickey’s wounds. It stings, but when Mickey complains, Ian just tells him not to be such a pussy about it. 

When he’s done, he stands up and tosses aside the rags and paper from the bandages for one of them to clean up later.

“Better?” he asks.

“Whatever.”

But it is.

It surprises him, that’s all. That’s why he jerks away when Gallagher puts a hand on the back of his neck and leans in like they’re going to kiss again all the sudden. 

“What the  _ fuck, _ Gallagher?” But Ian just throws up his hands and laughs. It sounds more like he’s exasperated than that he actually thinks it’s funny. 

“You want to take it back now, Mickey. Is that it? We can just pretend like it never happened?”

“That’s not what I fucking said.” Mickey snaps back. Ian acts like he never changes, like he never gives up anything for him. 

“Can I kiss you or not then?”

Mickey nods, and Ian once again puts a hand on the back of his neck. It’s not so much that he’s uncomfortable with the situation as it is having Ian’s face so close to his own is making his heart race, and he’s not entirely sure what to do with all the information his body is sending his brain. When Ian’s lips touch his, Mickey lets his eyes close and leans into it. 

It’s only Ian, after all. Just the two of them, here together. Alone. 

It’s only Ian, holding the back of his neck and breathing out of his nose softly against Mickey’s cheek. 

At this point, they’ve done so many things more intimate than this, it almost shouldn’t feel special, but still does. The way it feels when he opens his lips and lets Ian’s tongue into his mouth isn’t really comparable to anything else they’ve done. 

Kissing is always tied to the more romantic aspects of relationships: you kiss your spouse and fuck your lover. But being with Ian like this, their bodies pressed together and Ian’s tongue exploring his mouth, is definitely getting Mickey in the mood to do more. He’d almost forgotten his pants are still down around his ankles, but is pleasantly reminded now. 

It’s more than a minute later when Ian finally does pull away. They haven’t really done anything, but Mickey is breathing heavy, his dick hard and his chest rising and falling as though he just went on one of those late-night jogs Ian is so fond of. One of his hands goes down to stroke his dick absentmindedly and the other one wipes some of the spit off his lips. He thinks that’s it, that’s all the kissing they’re going to do, but when Ian gets his pants down too, he doesn’t put his hands on Mickey’s hips to spin him around. Instead, he leans back in, slowly this time, and brushes his nose against Mickey’s. When their lips meet again, it’s gentle. No tongues, no spit, just soft kisses and Ian’s hand in his hair, and their faces so close they’re breathing out warm air right on each other. 

Unlike sex, there doesn’t seem to be an end game here. Even when Ian pulls their bodies close again and takes both their erections in his hand, he doesn’t do much more than hold them. 

It’s nothing like what they usually do, but Mickey is starting to understand. He’s also interested in parting his lips so Ian’s tongue can slide back into his mouth and breathing steadily through his nose so they don’t have to pull apart again. His hands are holding Ian at the waist, keeping him close, but he’s not entirely sure what he wants to do anymore. Keep kissing Ian until it’s dark outside and their shift is over? Get off as quick as possible like usual and go back to work?

What he really wants to do is exactly this. To be safe and comfortable in Ian’s arms away from everyone else, but now that he has that, all he can think about is when it’s going to be over and what’s waiting for them out there when it is. 

Like he’s reading Mickey’s mind, Ian pulls away just enough to ask, “This is okay, right?” and when Mickey nods, he continues. “We can just be together, can’t we? When I get out of the group home, we can be together.”

Mickey nods. It’s an easy promise to make in each other’s arms like this. Hidden away. It’s harder, of course, to keep when they’re outside with the rest of the world and Mickey has more responsibilities than just what he wants or what Ian wants. 

“We’ll make it work.” He says though, because he’s pretty sure they can, and it’s good enough for Ian who goes back to kissing him without saying anything else. 

When did Ian get so much more experienced than him? Mickey can remember a time when they had been equals with this kind of stuff, at least he thinks he can, but now Ian’s clearly taken the lead. He pins Mickey against the shelf easily without breaking their kiss, and starts moving his hand for real, jerking them both off to the sounds of their heavy breathing, wet kisses, and always present hum of the air conditioning. Mickey lets him, more than willing to give up control for all the things Ian is making him feel, and the next time their tongues brush against each other, he lets out a soft groan. 

He’s not even sure if he’s doing this right, has no idea if there’s a correct way to kiss, but Ian’s doing most of the work anyways. With his tongue, and his hands. When everything feels too good and he doesn’t think he can only breathe through his nose any longer, they pull apart just enough so they’re panting in each other’s mouths, eyes closed. Any sound either one of them makes echoes around the space and comes back to them. 

Ian’s hand works them both, but it’s mostly the feeling of his breath on Mickey’s skin that’s edging him closer and closer. That, and the way Ian’s fingers are tightening in his hair, letting Mickey know, he’s feeling it too. 

He lets out another desperate moan when Ian’s palm brushes against a particularly good spot, and he feels the familiar tightness that tells him he’s  _ right there _ . Just a few more seconds. Ian presses their lips back together. Mickey can’t reciprocate, can’t think, but wants it badly just the same. When he does finish, he gasps out Ian’s name even though he can’t remember ever having done that before. 

He thinks maybe now Gallagher will turn him around and fuck him, but he doesn’t. Instead, he brings both hands up to Mickey’s face and holds it in place while they kiss. Nothing soft or gentle about it now. Ian seems intent on exploring every inch of the inside of Mickey’s mouth as though it’s something he’s been waiting for and he’s not going to miss his chance now that he’s got it. 

They’re so close there’s barely any room for Mickey’s body between Ian and the shelf. Even so, he manages to wiggle one of his hands between them, so he can wrap it around Ian’s cock and stroke it as much as the space allows. He barely gets going before he hears a muffled, “Oh, wait.” Then Ian lets out a moan Mickey can feel vibrating against his teeth and comes on both their stomachs. 

Still, he’s not done kissing Mickey. A few more soft ones on his lips, his cheek, then his neck and just below his ear. After that, he’s finally done, and takes a step back so they can both breathe their own air again. 

Gallagher’s a mess. His face flushed, lips even redder than usual. He almost always insists on taking off his shirt, but he’s forgotten this time and now there’s sweat stains and drying jizz on it, and Mickey knows he must look the same. Ian’s hair alone looks undisturbed, but it’s too short now for that not to be the case. Mickey seems to remember Ian jacking him off and then immediately grabbing his hair -longer than Ian’s and more liable to get messed up and give them away - and all he has to do is reach up to confirm it. His hand comes away slightly sticky with more than just sweat, as if he’s decided to try out a brand new type of all organic hair gel. 

“ _ Goddammit _ , Gallagher. Make  _ more _ of a mess.” 

Ian lets out a snort of laughter.

“Wait here. I’ll go find something...something to clean all this up.” He says hopping back into his pants and doing up his belt. 

They meet back in the hallway next to the cooler door, and Mickey takes the paper towels Ian offers, cracking open a bottled water from the case and pouring it over his head until it’s dripping on the linoleum. 

“Great! Now I’m going to have to mop.” 

“And whose fault is that?” Mickey asks, drying off his hair with the paper towels. 

“At least half yours.” Ian says, but he takes the water bottle and paper towels when Mickey offers and starts blotting at the spots on his t-shirt. 

Right on cue, some asshole starts pounding on the door to see if they’re inside, and Mickey goes to the front to get his jacket on and buttoned up so he can take care of it while Ian gets the mop and wet floor sign from the back. 

They’re being reckless again. It’s the kissing this time. Mickey just  _ wants  _ to so badly that he lets Ian pull him into one behind the counter or in the backs of the aisles when there’s no customers. 

There’s something else too: Frank knows, the shop clerk at the porn store must know...Linda? Lip? Mandy? And still Mickey is just Mickey. Even Nick and the whores at the rub ‘n tug. All of them challenged Mickey’s place, and he’s still here. Still making money. Still seeing Ian. 

None of it is an excuse to be reckless, but it all contributes. He only gets to see Ian at the Kash-and-Grab anymore too. The rest of his time is spent at home drinking beer and popping pills until it no longer hurts to sit. He’s exempt from work with Terry as long as he keeps playing up his injury a little, and he’s actually come close to finishing the main storyline of a video game for the first time since his early teens. 

A Milkovich vacation. 

Mandy continues sleeping on his couch, and Mickey keeps meaning to ask what’s so fucking wrong with her own room, but he doesn’t really mind the company. She also helps him keep his bandages clean until there’s barely anything but bruises left, and he can finally pull his boxers on without wincing. He doesn’t need the Oxy anymore, but with no one there to cut him off, he finds himself taking a few from the rapidly emptying bottle every so often regardless. 

Terry and his brothers are cooking up something big, something that will take them out of town, but aside from occasionally kicking him off the couch so they can plan, Mickey’s left out of it. It’s not until Mandy mentions she’s going to sneak into the group home with Lip that he realizes he might actually have the whole house to himself for the night. 

_ Reckless _

No, it’s an opportunity. Everything Ian’s always asking for - at least, the closest to it Mickey can get - a movie, beer, just the two of them. A memory they can share together instead of just telling each other about it the next day. It sits in the back of his mind the morning Terry and the others are set to leave as he and Ian go through the motions of opening the store together. He hasn’t brought it up with Ian yet. Now that he’s actually considering inviting him over for the night, it sounds kind of foolish in his head. 

What if Ian doesn’t want to come over? What if he thinks Mickey is stupid for even asking? What if this is the part where everyone jumps out and reveals it actually was just a joke all along?

The last thought is so stupid, Mickey decides to just get it over with and ask. 

First, he has to listen to Ian complain about the group home as if Mickey’s never been in one, or Juvie for that matter. He sounds like he’s in good hands with Lip at least, and Mickey doesn’t even want to imagine what kind of trouble he would get into there if he was left alone. The thing about Ian is that he’s always giving off low-level gay and down to fuck vibes that some guys can pick up on like they have built-in radars. It’s one thing when he’s picking up old guys with fat wallets to buy him things Mickey can’t afford, and another thing entirely when he’s stuck in a tight space surrounded by boys who would rather beat him bloody than admit they find his freckles attractive. 

He warns Ian not to trust any come-ons, but stops short of telling him about his own experiences. 

Then, casually, he invites Ian over.

“Was I just invited to a sleepover?” Ian teases.

Leave it to Gallagher to come up with the gayest way to say something. It’s just another reason he’ll be safer with Mickey at his place than in the group home. 

*-*-*

After work, Ian still has to go back and check in, and Mickey’s left in his empty house with no idea when he’ll show up. 

He does his best to get ready. The beer’s in the fridge already, so it’ll be cold. There’s popcorn, a few pizza rolls, a package of hot dogs but no buns. Maybe he should have gone shopping, but that’s Mandy’s job. Anyways, if the food at the group home is as bad as Ian says it is, he won’t have anything to complain about. 

It’s still only seven o’clock. 

Mickey doesn’t know when lights-out is for Ian and Lip, but he doubts it will be before the actual sun goes down. He walks through the empty rooms of his house, unable to settle down and unwilling to admit he’s actually kind of nervous about this. 

On his second pass through the kitchen, he spots the gun cupboard - bolted and locked, but he knows the combination - and decides to pass the time cleaning whatever Terry’s left behind. 

It’s soothing. The smell of the cleaner, the oil on the rags, the satisfying clicks as he takes apart and puts back together. By the time he’s finished, the sun has set but still no Ian. 

He’ll be here. He won’t forget, or bail, without telling Mickey. Still, there’s a persistent and uncomfortable feeling in his stomach all the way until he hears a knock at his door. 

It’s Ian because of course he didn’t forget and what else could he possibly have to do tonight that would make him bail. Mickey thinks maybe he’ll go in for a kiss again, and this time he’s ready, but instead Ian sets his bag down and looks around the house. 

“It’s empty. I already checked.” Mickey says, but Ian ignores him.

“Wow, you really cleaned up for me, huh?”

“Yeah, yeah. Fuck you. It can’t be worse than that place you’re staying.”

“Trust me, it’s better.” Ian finally turns to him, and now he does go in for a kiss and Mickey  _ is _ ready this time, and there really is no one else in the house. 

He’s already checked.

After a few minutes, Ian mentions that he’s hungry and Mickey suggests a movie, and now they’re on the couch with dinner and beer and each other. When Ian scoots closer, Mickey moves his arm out of the way and onto the back of the couch. It’s not an invitation, he’s just more comfortable like that, but Ian takes the opportunity to scoot even closer until he’s leaning against Mickey’s chest. He lets his arm fall over Ian’s shoulder, and it actually is more comfortable like that. 

Ian eats most of the pizza rolls, but hands Mickey the ones he doesn’t want to eat himself. They both run out of beer, but neither of them gets up to get more. When Ian’s more comfortable, laying along the couch on his side, head resting on Mickey’s lap, he take’s Mickey’s hand from his shoulder, brings it to his nose, and sniffs.

“You smell really good tonight.”

“Shh, I’m trying to watch the movie.” Ian glances up to check if he’s serious, and Mickey sees him do it because he’s not actually watching.

“What do you like about this movie so much?” Ian asks when he sees Mickey looking at him.

“The explosions.”

Ian lets out a snort. He’s still holding Mickey’s hand, but he’s not smelling it anymore. Instead, he’s running the tips of his fingers along the palm like he’s feeling all the ridges.

“Every movie has explosions.”

“Bullshit. I’ve seen that shit you watch with Mandy. No explosions.”

“Okay. Maybe not  _ every _ movie.”

Ian stays silent for a minute, still playing with Mickey’s hand.

“What do you like about me?” He asks out of the blue, and maybe now would be a great time to get more beer. “And don’t say sex.” He adds when Mickey doesn’t respond.

“I wasn’t gonna say sex.”

“What were you going to say?”

“That I need another beer.” Mickey shakes his empty bottle, and Ian sighs but sits up so he can get another one. 

In the kitchen, away from Ian’s probing stare, he considers. What does he like about him? He likes Ian. End of story. Not just any one thing, but all the things. Everything about him all put together. He likes Ian because he’s selfish, and that’s what it really comes down to. Mickey is selfish and he wants all the things he can’t have and he’s putting everyone, including Ian, at risk so he can have them.

_ You’re a man, now _ , Terry had said, but it’s not true. If he was a man he would have let all of this go a long time ago. 

“You coming back?” Ian calls from the couch, and Mickey grabs the beer from the fridge and goes to sit back down. 

He never answers the question, but Ian must not mind too much and he doesn’t ask again. Ten minutes later he’s straddling Mickey’s lap and kissing him even though they both taste like beer and pizza pockets, and he has to be careful to hold all his weight up so Mickey’s injury doesn’t start hurting again. 

It should get boring or disgusting, or both, having their lips pressed together like this, mouths open, Ian’s tongue touching his, but Mickey hasn’t tired of it yet. It’s so much like sex, and yet, not quite. Like a missing piece of it. Something they’ve obviously been neglecting and now they need to play two years worth of catch-up tonight, in the hours between dusk and dawn. 

Mickey’s hard in his pants and he can feel Ian’s erection pressing into his stomach too, but if they take off their clothes now they’ll just bang, and Mickey will last exactly as long as Ian expects him to. He’d rather just do this. At least for a few more minutes until the urge to see Ian naked again is too strong to ignore. They  _ can _ get naked now, too. Completely. They’re alone and inside and there’s no chance of anyone walking in on them this time. If they want, they can strip down and kiss naked on the couch for the rest of the night. 

Ian lets out a little ‘oof’ when Mickey pushes him off.

“What?”

“Take off your clothes.” Mickey tells him, already pulling his own tank top over his head. Ian laughs but starts stripping off his clothes too. 

Mickey finishes just in time to help Ian with his socks, and this time he ends up on top with Ian lying stretched out on the couch below him. He was right about them being naked. Now the rhythm of their kissing has gone from lazy to purposeful, and the fact that Mickey can touch any part of Ian he wants isn’t making it any easier to calm himself down. 

He pulls away from the kiss and sits up, straddling Ian, so he can get a better view of all the things he has, for tonight only, totally unfettered access to. 

“What do you think about,” Ian asks, pulling himself up onto his elbows, “when you look at me like that?”

“You, you dumb shit. I think about you.”

Ian laughs a little, but the answer must satisfy him because he lets his head fall back down and doesn’t bother Mickey again while he looks. It’s hard to look and not touch for this long, but Mickey still takes his time. He looks at Ian’s hair, his cheeks, his ears, but avoids his eyes because he doesn’t want to see the way he’s looking right back. He puts both of his hands on Ian’s chest to touch the sparse hair there, then gets to feel them rise and fall as he breathes. 

“Do you want to take a shower?” Ian asks, still looking right at him even though Mickey is still avoiding eye contact.

“Thought you said I smelled good today.”

“You do. But I hate the showers at the home, and you’re getting dirt all over me.”

It’s not dirt, it’s carbon buildup from the guns, but it is all over Mickey’s hands and leaving long lines of black smudges along Ian’s skin where he touches him. 

“Sure. Alright.”

But it’s easier said than done. When Ian makes a move to sit up, it brings their faces closer and, even though showering was his idea, he takes Mickey by the back of the neck again and pulls him into another kiss. He doesn’t complain either when Mickey’s dirty hands go to his shoulders and leave more smudges, and they fall back onto the couch. 

It’s just too much to walk away from: being naked like this, so comfortable on top of Ian and able to grind down on him as much as he wants. Even when Ian’s erection starts digging into his hip painfully, still Mickey won’t let him up. Finally Ian starts to realize they’re not going anywhere for now and his body relaxes into the cushions. Mickey relaxes too, lets some of the weight he’s been holding on his knees rest on Ian instead. Rather than complain, or push him off, something about the way he moves must rub Ian just the right way, and he breaks the kiss to let out a shaky moan, his hips pushing up roughly into Mickeys.

“Okay, new plan.” Ian says breathlessly, and he grabs Mickey by the waist so he can flip them both over. “I didn’t forget this time.”

He gets off the couch and starts digging through his bag, and Mickey takes the chance to sit up and chug the rest of his beer. He also tries to wipe his hands on one of the cushions, but it doesn’t make much of a difference and they come away looking just as sooty as before. 

Ian comes back with lube and Mickey could tell him he has an entirely full, brand-new bottle in the top drawer of his dresser, but he looks so proud of himself for remembering, there’s no point. 

“Lay back down.” He says, and Mickey does, spreading his legs so Ian can fit between them. “Then we’re going to shower.”

“Sure.” 

“Tell me if something hurts.”

Now it’s Mickey’s turn to snort. Ian has no idea how it feels to have someone else inside him. Can’t even begin to imagine it any more than Mickey could before the first time they did this. Maybe one day he’ll show Ian, and  _ then  _ he’ll understand, but not tonight; he’s too selfish for that. Tonight he wants to be the only one getting fucked, and, as always, Ian’s happy to oblige. 

He pushes his fingers into Mickey, all the way to the knuckle. Then pulls them out slow and repeats the action. Mickey shows his appreciation by spreading his legs wider and arching his back into the sensation. They’ve been fooling around now for almost an hour and he’s turned on enough not to give a fuck what he looks like squirming and digging his heels into the couch cushion while Ian finger fucks him. All he wants is to feel the pleasure of Ian curling his fingers, hitting all the best spots. 

He’s not trying to put on a show, but maybe he plays it up a little. He’s just making the best of their temporary privacy, and the next time Ian pushes his fingers all the way in, he lets out the needy sort of groan he usually forces himself to hold in. 

“Do that again.” Ian says, and pulls his fingers out just to push them back in, as deep as he can. Mickey tries, but he’s caught off guard this time and the sound he makes is more startled, less of a groan than a whimper. 

“Holy fuck,” Ian whispers and then his fingers are gone, and Mickey knows what’s coming next but maybe he shouldn’t have gotten Gallagher so worked up right before. Or maybe he knew exactly what he was doing because by the time his dick is pushing into Mickey, there’s very little of the gentle, concerned Ian left. In his place is the Ian Mickey likes best. The one who isn’t afraid to get a little dirty, who will search out the roughest brick walls to bang against until both of their hands are covered in tiny scrapes. The Ian who absolutely will fuck around and find out just to see how much chaos he can cause in one go. 

That’s the Ian who fucks him now. Hard, focused on his own pleasure as much as Mickey’s, but they both want the same thing anyway and this is the best way to get them there. 

Ian pushes inside him all in one smooth motion, holding Mickey’s legs and hips up so he can get the best angle. Mickey’s hands grab onto the arm of the couch behind his head for support and he lets out a few more strangled sounds that only make Ian fuck him harder. 

What he doesn’t expect are the noises Ian makes in return: a few sharp gasps and then a whine that has ‘oh fuck’ all tangled up inside it. His last few thrusts are so fast and sporadic, it might have made Mickey come too if he wasn’t so focused on watching Ian, his eyes tightly shut, mouth open, as he loses himself in his own orgasm. 

When he’s done, chest heaving, cock still mostly hard inside Mickey, he opens his eyes but looks away towards the TV where the movie’s title screen is playing on a loop. 

“Holy shit. I can’t believe I just did that.” He lets go of Mickey’s legs and leans forward so he can kiss him without pulling out. “You’re just so fucking hot,” He whispers against his lips and Mickey reaches down to stroke himself while Ian talks. “I wanted to fuck you so bad. Every night. Can’t even jack off thinking about it.” Now Ian’s moved to his ear lobe and sucks on it between whispers. He still hasn’t pulled out. Mickey knows he’s going to come himself any second, but tries to hold off, wants to hear what Ian has to say.

“Have I ever told you how good you are at taking cock? And the fucking sounds you make. Oh my god.” 

He’s making some now. Tiny whimpers he’s trying to stifle so he can listen to Ian talk, but he’s right on the edge, feeling a kind of ecstasy that can’t possibly be sustainable. If he doesn’t let himself come right now he might actually lose his mind.

“Mickey. I fucking love you.” Ian says, and it’s not fair. Not fair at all for him to say something like that right when Mickey can’t think, can’t speak. To make it be the last thing he hears before he’s jizzing on his hand and between their stomachs and a million miles away the L is passing by overhead making the whole house rattle, but it’s not loud enough to cover up what Ian’s said or Mickey’s answering moans.

Ian finally pulls out, but only so he can scoot down a little and lay his head on Mickey’s chest, listening to his rapid heartbeat. They really do need to shower now, but if he was feeling unmotivated before, it’s nothing compared to his current state. Ian is dead weight on top of him, maybe still listening to his heartbeat, even though it must have slowed some by now. 

What finally gets him moving isn’t the sharp pain in his butt where Ian is pressing him against the couch, but the movie’s title screen. It’s playing the same orchestral music over and over again, and he has to push Ian off and get the remote before he hears it even one more time. 

Ian sits up and rubs his eyes like he had been about to fall asleep. Now he has black splotches, jizz, and lube on him, but he seems less concerned than before. He grabs his half full beer off the table and chugs it while Mickey shuts off the TV. 

“Fuck it. Let’s just shower in the morning.” he says, and Mickey’s never been more happy to agree to something in his life. He doesn’t want the night to end, but Ian looks dead on his feet, and part of him staying here instead of the group home is so he can have a restful night away from the steel cot he’s been sleeping on. Mickey’s starting to feel his injury now too. After days of only the occasional dull ache, the pain has come alive again reminding him it can get so much worse if he continues to push it. 

Ian follows him into the bedroom and opens the window while Mickey lays face down on the bed.

“It smells like weed and hairspray in here.” 

“Fucking Mandy. She’s sleeping on the couch.”

“I thought maybe you were bringing girls back here or something.”

Mickey lets out a snort against his pillow. 

“That’d make Terry happy.”

“Are you alright?” Ian shuts off the light and climbs onto the bed between Mickey and the wall.

“Fine. Ass just hurts.” He says, but when Ian wraps his arms around him, Mickey scoots back to press against him. 

“So does that mean you don’t want to go again?”

“When the fuck did I say that?” Mickey makes like he’s going to roll over, pain be damned, but Ian tightens his hold and stops him. 

“Don’t be an asshole. I was joking. You can’t just...let me do what I want all the time.”

“I’m not your mom, Gallagher. You want someone to tell you what to do-”

“That’s not what I said!” Ian pulls him in even tighter and rests his chin on Mickey’s shoulder. “Do you like what we do?”

“The fuck kind of question is that?”

“I don’t know. I just… I want you to know that I meant it, what I said earlier.”

Mickey knows exactly what he’s talking about but doesn’t believe him. No one means anything they say during sex, and they sure as shit don’t talk about it later. 

“I meant it when I said I love you.” Ian says purposefully when Mickey doesn’t answer, still holding him tightly from behind.

“Fuck off.”

“No. You don’t have to say it too, but I want you to know. I’ve never cared about anyone the way I care about you.”

When he’s done talking, the dark room falls silent.

_ Caring _ about someone. Is that what love is? Is he supposed to be in love with Ian just because he gives a shit about him? Because he wants Ian to be around all the time and the only dreams he has for the future involve the two of them together? And even if that is something like love, it makes no difference. Tomorrow they’re going back to their lives, and this one night won’t matter. If they ever get more nights together, in actual beds, they’ll be few and far between. 

Besides, the idea of loving Ian is misery. Imagine how much worse their situation would be if they were in love.  _ How could he bear it _ ? How could anyone?

Neither of them fall asleep right away, but they don’t talk anymore either. Eventually Ian drifts off first, still spooning Mickey who stays up for another hour listening to the gentle sound of his snores. 

Ian’s going through something. He’s tired, maybe scared, away from home and all the things that smell like him. So when he says love, what he probably means is wants. He wants Mickey. Wants him to be around, wants to fuck him and talk to him and all the things they’ve always done, and there’s nothing wrong with that. 

Just not love.

_ Please god don’t let it be love.  _

*-*-*

Just as Mickey’s finally falling asleep, safe in the arms of his boyfriend, some five hundred miles south of Chicago his father is standing in front of a hotel bed taking inventory. Terry Milkovich has a horrible feeling in the pit of his gut, but takes everything apart - all the bags, gun cases,  _ everything  _ \- again just to be sure. 

But it’s not here.

The cloned key-card he paid almost two grand for that they  _ need _ to pull this off. It’s not in any of the stuff here, and Terry knows exactly where it is. On his nightstand, next to her picture, sitting on top of the Bible his mother-in-law had given him on their wedding day:

_ To my new son, may the Lord keep you close to his heart, and watch over the two of you as... _ Yada yada yada.

Terry chucks the whiskey bottle in his hand at the wall in anger. It smashes above his eldest son who jumps out of the way and looks back at him warily. 

If Mikhailo was here, Terry might have sent him back. That boy at least has some sense, but as much as he loves his older sons, he’s not going to send one of them. There’s only just enough time to make one run, to the house and back again, and he can’t risk them coming back with the wrong thing. 

He’ll have time. It’ll mean driving through the night, but he’ll have time.

*-*-*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you all have a happy, healthy post-election week! Thank you as always for reading. I'll definitely put a warning in the notes for the next chapter, but I really am committed to writing season 4 so we don't have to end on a downer :)


	5. Say When

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Terry walks in on Mickey and Ian. Svetlana gets called. Mickey lays low and tries to decide what to do with his life in the aftermath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, here it is. If you don't want to read this part, please don't! We all know what happens here, and I'll have another chapter posted next week!!

Season 3; Chapter 5: Say When

**[Content Warning: Physical Assault; Rape]**

Morning comes too fast.

Ian’s up first, but he doesn’t let Mickey sleep in. He’s late, extremely late. He was supposed to be back before the sun was up, but now he’s certainly missed whatever morning check-in the kids at the home are subjected to. He doesn’t seem too worried about it, and makes Mickey turn on the shower for him even though the faulty faucet isn’t that hard to figure out once you get the screw in just the right spot.

It’s just a ploy to drag Mickey in too, once the water’s as hot as it’s going to get, and they waste thirty more minutes with nothing but a single bar of soap between them. When they get out, the water’s finally running clear instead of black with soot and whatever else either of them has collected since they last washed. 

By the time Ian is drying off, there’s no way he’s going to make it back for morning anything at the group home, and seems to have given up on the idea. He comes up behind Mickey while he’s at the bathroom sink swishing mouthwash and wraps his arms around him. 

“Let’s go back to bed.” Ian mumbles against his shoulder. 

Mickey swallows.

“Can’t. Aren’t you supposed to work today?”

“ _ We  _ are, but Linda won’t notice if we’re a few minutes late.”

That’s a lie if Mickey’s ever heard one, but Ian’s hands are making a more compelling argument, running along his bare stomach and teasing that they might go lower.

“Come back to bed with me” Ian says again, but this time he whispers it seductively, and Mickey-

_ knew I shouldn’t _

-gives in because when Ian leaves it’s over, and he has no idea when the next time they’ll have another chance to be in bed together. He turns around in Ian’s arms until they’re face-to-face. “Ten minutes, Gallagher. Some of us don’t have rich doctors buying us shit all the time. Actually gotta work for a living.”

“That  _ is _ work.” Ian says with a sigh, but he’s smiling and nudging them towards the bathroom door and has that look in his eye that says he’s going to kiss Mickey again. Sure enough, he does. No tongue this time just Ian’s hands on his face like he’s afraid he might try to run or something, and maybe Mickey deserves that.

When Ian pulls away, his smile looks devious. 

“Ready to return the favor?” He asks, and there’s so many possibilities for what that could mean, Mickey can’t settle on any one. Ian sees his confusion, and rolls his eyes, “It’s called eating ass Mickey, and I seem to remember you enjoying it.”

“ _ Fuck no. _ ” Mickey has to look away because he can feel his face giving away his embarrassment. 

“It’s not even dirty. We literally just showered together.” 

“That’s not even the point.”

“Then what is the point?” Ian says, but he sounds amused, not frustrated, and he’s looking at Mickey in the most patronizing way possible. Like he already knows everything he might say, and never expected him to agree in the first place.

“The point- I’m not…” Ian has a gift. Something unnatural. That’s the only explanation for how one person could possibly be so goddamn frustrating. “How’s that fun for me?”

Ian just keeps smiling, looking amused. It’s not that Mickey doesn’t want to make him feel good - and,  _ god,  _ had that felt good when Ian did it to him - but it’s just another example of how completely out of his depth he is when they’re together. Whatever happened to the two of them just banging?

Maybe this is exactly why Ian dates other men. Just like kissing; maybe it never had anything to do with money after all. 

“Fine.” Mickey says. “Bend over.”

He likes the surprised look on Ian’s face better, like maybe Gallagher doesn’t know him as well as he thinks he does. 

“Are you serious?” 

“Fucking bend over. Before I change my mind.”

Ian’s looking at him, but Mickey doesn’t feel like making eye contact right now. His hand is rubbing at his bottom lip and, without really thinking about it, he forces it back down to his side. 

Tentatively, like he also hadn’t fully considered what he was suggesting, Ian gets on the bed, on his knees, and bends over for Mickey. 

“Could fuck you while I’m back here too. If that’s what you’re into now.”

“Please don’t.”

But that time Mickey’s not serious. His mouth is doing that thing where it makes words to cover up for the fact he has no idea what he’s doing. Part of him still wants to call the whole thing off as a joke, but then Ian will have been right about him. 

He asked how this would be fun for him, and what’s more fun than proving someone else wrong?

The bed squeaks as he gets on to it, also on his knees, behind Ian, and gives another tired groan as he leans forward. It’s not going to be like a blow job, where his hands can do at least half the work; he’s just going to have to use his tongue like Ian had for him, and there’s no point stalling because it’s not going to get any easier the longer he looks. 

He starts by licking the exposed skin of Ian’s balls because that’s easier, feels more like familiar territory, then moves his tongue upwards. When he slides it over Ian’s hole, there’s a sharp gasp towards the head of the bed that gives him the courage to do it again. By the third time, he’s using his hands to spread Ian’s cheeks so his tongue can get in a little further with more room to maneuver. 

The bed is groaning again. This time under Ian’s weight as he pushes his head down into the mattress and his hips up. Mickey focuses on doing the things that get him to make noise. Especially the needy sounds Ian moans against the pillow when Mickey’s tongue actually goes inside him then flicks back out. Those sound the most like Ian has no control over his own mouth or the noises that come out of it. He remembers that when their positions had been reversed Ian had used his fingers too, but Mickey doesn’t feel confident at all doing something like that to Gallagher. He sticks to using his mouth, flattening his tongue, rubbing it against the most sensitive spots he can find until the bed is squeaking again, this time from the rapid thumping of Ian jerking himself off. 

Now every time Ian breathes out, he’s making some kind of noise. The room is full of his grateful moans, and they’ve forgotten to close the window but there’s no point stopping now. Not when he can feel the tension in Ian’s thighs under his hands, or when he pushes his tongue in as far as it will go and feels Ian clench around him. 

Muffled against the pillow, Mickey hears Ian moan his name like it’s the dirtiest curse word he can think of. Then it’s just ‘ _ fuck, fuck, fuck’  _ until Ian is coming on the sheets and Mickey keeps licking him because the whole point of this was to make Gallagher feel good. 

Eventually, Ian pulls himself away and rolls onto the bed on his back. Mickey stays on his knees on the far end of the bed, but straightens up and wipes his lips. Ian tastes like Irish Spring.

“Fuck. It’s stupid how good that feels.” Ian says, one hand covering his eyes, and it makes Mickey laugh. 

“We really do have to go to work now don’t we?” Ian asks after a pause, peeking through his fingers. Mickey doesn’t respond though. He’s still turned on, processing everything they just did, and looking towards the window thinking about how any number of people could have heard Ian in his bed, moaning Mickey’s name. 

The silence stretches out, but doesn’t seem to bother Ian. He just lays on his back and watches until Mickey blinks a few times and remembers he’s there. 

“Yeah.” Mickey nods, stretching his hands up towards the ceiling lazily, then rubbing his eyes. “Time to go.”

“Unless you’ve got something else in mind.” Ian says playfully, but his dick is soft and the way he’s stretched out on the bed makes him look more ready for an afternoon nap than anything. 

“Wouldn’t want to tire you out. Gotta save something for those group home boys.”

“Don’t be a dick.” Ian says, and tosses the pillow at his face, but Mickey catches it and throws it back down. 

“Well, I’m going to go get my clothes,” Ian pulls himself off the bed while he talks, “And if you want some help with that,” He reaches out to grab Mickey’s dick but gets swatted away before he can, “Just ask.”

Mickey debates between getting dressed and going to work with Ian, letting Ian go to work alone so he can spend the rest of the time before everyone gets home touching himself, or keeping Ian here so they can continue doing weird things to each other. It’s not a very difficult decision.

There’s also that sex toy he bough the other day; the one he should almost certainly keep to himself except he’s been keeping it to himself this whole time and hasn't even used it yet. He just can’t find the courage to do that kind of stuff when Ian’s not with him, egging him on. 

So he brings it out to the living room with him.

“And how’s that fun for me?” Ian teases him mockingly. As if he wasn’t feeling stupid enough already just asking. The one time he tries to go out of his way, step up his game, and Gallagher shoots him down just like that.  _ He’s  _ the one who just wants to bang like normal when Ian’s coming back from his other boyfriend’s with all this new weird shit to try. Whatever. He probably should have assumed Ian would be hard again not five minutes after jizzing all over his sheets. 

So they’ll fuck instead. Right here on the living room couch, and Mickey’s starting to think they aren’t going to make it to work after all.

“Just go easy on the injured cheek.” It’s still sore from last night, but  _ oh god  _ having Ian inside him like this is worth it, and maybe-

There’s no words Mickey can ever find to make sense of the next hour of his life. Terry comes home early. That’s all. It’s not really adequate to describe the third and final time he and Ian are caught banging, but adding anything else kind of feels like overkill. 

Terry comes home early and finds his youngest son getting fucked in the ass by the boy who lives down the street. 

Rather than even the slightest hint of embarrassment, all Mickey feels in the moment is fear and panic. In a few seconds, he and his father skip every step between rumors, lies, cover-ups, and getting kicked out of the house, and go straight to the physical part; which is too bad for Mickey because it’s not a fight he stands any chance of winning. Terry’s got more than a hundred pounds on him, decades of experience, and, after a long night of driving, not a drop of alcohol in his system to slow him down. 

Worse: of all the times Mickey let this scenario play out in his head, Ian was never there, never the focus of any of his father’s rage. It was always just Mickey, alone. Mickey taking the punishment for his own sins because he should have known better but did it anyway. That was obviously wishful thinking; now that it’s happening in reality, Terry goes for Ian first. 

Through the panic, it gets Mickey moving in a way he might not have been able to otherwise, and he grabs his father around the neck from behind before he can do something irreparable to the only good person Mickey’s ever known. There’s no time to worry about winning, he just wants to give Ian a chance to get the fuck out of the house because dying is so much easier when you’re doing it alone. 

Mickey feels like nothing compared to the weight of his father, but Terry takes the bait and focuses his anger on the person who really deserves it instead. 

He’s never hit Mickey this hard, never made his chest so tight with terror, never pulled a gun on him. Not like this; not with the full intention of using it. There’s no getting away; Terry’s punches land not as a warning, or punishment. He wants Mickey to go down and stay down, and after the third or fourth blow, his son no longer has any choice in the matter. 

Ian doesn’t even make it to the door, but Mickey’s own body is taking up most of his headspace. Forcing him to concentrate on pulling panicked breaths in through his mouth instead of looking at anything else going on in the room. A good portion of Terry’s weight is pushing right down onto his hips and making the twinges from his injury earlier seem like nothing compared to what he’s feeling now. There’s no way to make him stop, no way to push him off, and Mickey will just have to live with the pain until it’s all over. That’s always the worst part because once the pain starts the only thing your body and mind can agree on is that it needs to stop.  _ Now. _

What about when you can’t make it stop? What happens when you don’t have any control? 

There’s no controlling Terry, no appealing to his better side; he doesn’t have one. 

Yesterday, Mickey would have said he could take it: a beating, the shame, whatever  _ it _ was as long as it meant he and Ian could be together. Today he knows the truth. He’ll do anything to make it stop. Anything.

_ Please, god, I’ll change _

He has the thought and less than a second later, Terry hits him with his pistol. Right in the face, just under his eye. Like a miracle, a gift from above, some of the pain does fade for Mickey right along with everything else in the room. 

No more messing around, no more fatherly advice. Terry’s reached his limit with his smarmy, back-talking son who should have learned years ago this isn’t how a man behaves. 

The next part Mickey can never remember, not that he often tries. He’s neither conscious nor unconscious. Instead, he’s somewhere between the two: like he’s had a late night and now it’s morning and his alarm is going off, but he needs just a few more minutes of semi-sleep before he can even realize he’s awake. Whatever’s happening around him is just as much of a dream as what’s going on inside his head; he’d focus if he could, but there’s no option for that. His one choice is to lay, unmoving on the couch, eyes half closed, drooling into the cushion and only continuing to draw air into his lungs because some deep-seated survival instinct won’t let him stop. 

Ian doesn’t have the luxury of forgetting the next twenty minutes. He has to remember every second of watching Mickey’s chest move, terrified by the vacant look in his eyes, convinced that at any second his breathing could stop. He has to listen to Terry as he paces by the door, muttering things to himself that may have been cruel and hateful in other circumstances, but which sound so confused and jumbled coming out of the old man’s mouth now, it only scares him more. 

The worst part, the part he never tells  _ anyone _ about, comes fifteen minutes after Terry makes the call. He’s still standing by the door, in the middle of a long, muttered rant, when Mickey starts to come to, groaning and pushing his hands against the cushions like he’s going to try to sit up. 

Terry stops talking all at once and looks over at his son. 

Ian meant it - didn’t doubt it for even a second - when he told Mickey he loved him, but he still can’t physically make himself move when Terry walks over to the couch and raises his gun. He looks conflicted, deeply torn, like a man who’s about to shoot a beloved dog that’s gone rabid, and Ian’s never wanted to scream more in his entire life. He can’t scream because this is a nightmare; his throat is too tight to make a sound, and his legs are shaking against the couch, unwilling to lift him because Terry will  _ kill _ him if he tries to interfere. He might kill Mickey, though, if he doesn’t.

“Please. Please, don’t.” Ian has to fight against his own throat to say the words because it’s one thing to believe you’d die for someone and quite another to actually walk yourself up the gallows. “Please. It’s my fault. He didn’t- It’s all my fault.”

For a second it doesn’t look like his words have any effect - like maybe there’s not going to be any reasoning with Mickey’s father even if Ian’s willing to die trying - but then Terry slowly lowers the gun. Rather than shoot his son, he grabs Mickey by the hair with his free hand and pulls him up into a sitting position while Ian watches. Mickey gives a few slow blinks as his eyes try to focus. 

“Dad?” He says softly and Terry hunkers down so he can get close to his son’s face. He puts one hand on the back of Mickey’s neck and forces his head up even though Ian can tell by his unfocused eyes that wherever Mickey’s mind is at, it’s not here, listening to his dangerously unbalanced father ramble. And ramble he does. In a soft voice that sounds nothing like the man that, less than twenty minutes ago, hit his son in the face so hard he’s currently taking a temporary break from reality. 

He tells Mickey that everything’s going to be okay. That Terry will fix it. That no one will know. That it’s not Mickey’s fault. Then he continues talking, but it starts to make less sense. Something about their mother getting a job and maybe that’s why Mickey thinks this kind of thing is okay. 

It’s around this time Ian starts to really understand something that he’s not sure even Mandy and Mickey comprehend: that there’s something very  _ wrong _ with Terry Milkovich. He’s nothing like Frank. He’s not a shit father; he’s barely a father at all. 

Maybe that’s what they’ve been trying to tell him this whole time. 

Mickey’s definitely awake now. He gives a few feeble nods while Terry talks and a very soft, “Yes, sir,” when he’s finished. Terry touches his son’s face one time even though it makes Mickey twitch and cringe away, then he resumes his vigil at the door, waiting for whatever’s coming next.

*-*-*

While Ian sits - for all intents and purposes - alone in a room with Terry Milkovich, Mickey’s in the middle of a perfect dream. Or maybe it’s a memory. Either way, it kind of feels like it’s happening right now. 

He’s young again, just eight years old, and his mother has decided to take him and Mandy downtown to the waterfront. He can smell the breeze coming off the lake, feel the warmth of the sun, and hear the birds cawing somewhere overhead. In front of him, Mandy is running, carefree, her hair done up in a scrunchie and her arms spread out to her sides as she sprints across the cement walkway. His mother is standing to his left, calling out for her to ‘Be careful!’ but she’s laughing. 

There’s some pain too, but it’s so distant that, for a few wonderful minutes, Mickey’s convinced the pain is the memory, and  _ this  _ is what’s happening right now. 

He can’t hang on to it for long. Mandy, his mother, they both slip away and leave Mickey alone to fall into a familiar nightmare instead. It’s his father, talking right into his face, and now the pain is so much more present. The words sound like gibberish, but the tone is clear.

_ Listen Mikhailo _

The trick isn’t to listen. The trick is to not blink too much, to nod occasionally, and when Terry’s done, to say ‘yes, sir’ like you mean it. He tries but, like all nightmares, when he goes to speak his voice doesn’t come out sounding like much at all. 

Terry walks away when he’s done talking, and leaves Mickey to remember that this isn’t a dream. The pain is too real, for one. A constant throbbing ache in his head that his mind couldn’t possibly manufacture. He can also taste blood and thinks maybe he bit his tongue or his cheek, but it’s too difficult to tell any one painful spot from the others.

_ Ian and I were- _

Yes, he can remember now. He wasn’t at the water with his mother. He was in his own house, getting fucked by Ian, and Terry had come home early. 

It’s agony, lifting his chin off his chest and forcing his eyes to focus, but he has to know. Has to be sure. When he does, he sees that Ian is still here. Not dead, just scared, and that’s a good sign because if Terry was going to kill him, he probably already would have. Probably already would have killed both of them, but Mickey can’t even guess right now why he hasn’t. 

_ What are we waiting for? _

For someone to come and take him away somewhere he’ll never come back from. A final resting vat fit for the son no one wanted. Maybe Ian too, and that’ll be on Mickey; no question about it. He knew exactly what he was getting them into when he started fucking around with Ian, and now that the inevitable has come to pass there’s no denying it. This is all on him. 

_ Oh, fuck. I don’t want to die _

He really doesn’t, but can’t pull his thoughts together long enough to imagine a scenario that will save them from whatever Terry has planned. His gun is in the bedroom, every other firearm except the one in his father’s hands is locked away. He put the padlock on the cabinet himself last night. If someone is coming to take him away, will he be able to bargain for Ian’s life, for his own? What could he possibly offer?

He thinks all of this while they wait and, in the end, it turns out he’s just being dramatic. It’s not a familiar feeling for him at all, but this is hardly a familiar situation. 

When the door opens it isn’t men with cold eyes and vinyl gloves on their hands coming to take him away; it’s the woman from the rub ‘n tug. She does have cold eyes, and cold hands if he’s remembering right, but Mickey’s not feeling so hot right now himself either.

Terry  _ still _ doesn’t understand. He’s two years behind Mickey at least, thinking that a pretty girl with a nice ass is all it will take to make everything right. Maybe he should be happy: Terry hasn’t given up on him yet. But under the relief, there’s something else. 

Part of him thinks that if it’s over, just let it end. 

How many years before he’s right back in the same place? How many more times does he have to be found out before someone finally puts him out of his misery? If anyone was going to, it should have been Terry. The only silver lining is that maybe his father knows something he doesn’t; maybe this really is the last warning Mickey will ever need. Maybe this time he finally  _ will _ stop. 

He understands what’s happening now, at least. 

When she goes for his boxers he helps her, and when she does her best to maneuver his soft dick inside her, he helps with that too even though everything,  _ everywhere _ , hurts. Because the pain isn’t going anywhere, but what’s happening now will end. Just like all of Terry’s lectures eventually end. 

Mickey’s sure as shit learned his lesson this time. 

All that time Ian spent worrying about Mickey fucking girls, and now he gets to watch. Not only that, but he has the gall to look disgusted; scared. When it’s Mickey,  _ again _ , taking the bullet for both of them. 

And whose fault is that?

_ At least half yours _ , Mickey thinks at him with bitterness as comforting as it is familiar. 

He flips the woman over easily, just like he always wishes he could do when it’s Terry pinning him down, and the second he’s taken their weight off his hips, enough of the pain fades away that what he feels in its place is relief.

Terry is watching, but this feels nothing like that visit to the rub ‘n tug. This time he  _ wants  _ to fuck her. Not because she’s hot, and only partly because he has to. Mostly he just wants to fuck her because he’s angry. At himself, at Terry, at Ian, at  _ her _ . It doesn’t matter; for a minute he’s so pissed-off he could fuck her right into the couch and then burn this whole house down, with everyone inside it. 

The feeling doesn’t last long.

When the anger disappears, what takes its place is an emptiness unlike anything he’s ever felt before. The only scrap of good will he ever feels towards Svetlana comes right now, from her willingness to help him when, all the sudden, he just doesn’t feel like he can do this anymore. Not just what they’re currently doing, but all of it. Every facet of life; he doesn’t want to have anything to do with any of it anymore. 

Maybe it’s just because she’s a whore and that’s how she always does it, but when Mickey’s got nothing left for this charade, she puts on a show for the both of them. Wrapping her legs around him, and pulling his head against her shoulder so he doesn’t have to look at anything. When Mickey’s arms are about to give out, she holds him tighter, takes his weight without complaint. The choked sobs he lets out are genuine, but have more to do with the sharp pain of her foot digging into his ass than anything else going on. 

When it’s finally done - and it really has to be, he doesn’t have anything left even to keep pretending - he holds himself up just long enough for her to slide out from under him. As soon as she does, he collapses on the couch, head turned to the side to keep from putting pressure on the part of his face that got it the worst. With the same speed he and Ian had gotten their boxers on earlier, she grabs her dress off the floor, steps into it, and pulls it up. 

Terry puts his gun on the arm of the couch and looks at Mickey, who does his best to keep his eyes open and stare right back. Finally, he turns away and says to Ian, “You want a turn?”

Ian doesn’t answer, and Mickey can’t see the look on his face from where he’s laying. 

“Get out, and don’t you ever come back.” Terry says, but it doesn’t sound like Ian’s moving. 

_ Just go. Please go. _

Terry only waits another second before he gets off the chair. Mickey watches from the couch as he drags a struggling and half-naked Ian to the door and literally throws him out. Slamming it shut behind him. 

“Clean this fucking mess up!” He yells at Mickey then disappears further into the house. He reappears a few minutes later and leaves out the front door without another word. 

Mickey almost forgets the woman is still there until she squats down next to the couch to look at him. 

“I go now?” She asks, and when Mickey gives a little nod, she leaves too. 

*-*-*

He has to get up and knows it. Terry may have just gone out for a pack of smokes; might be back any second. He  _ needs _ to get up. 

He stays on the couch for almost an hour. Staring towards the window, piecing himself back together just enough so he can do what he needs to. At first, he gets caught up in his thoughts, his feelings - about Ian, his father, himself - but that’s a trap. He doesn’t need those. What he needs is for them to 

_ GO AWAY _

so he can focus on what he should be doing: cleaning up this mess. 

It seems like too much - impossible - but, like always, there’s no choice. Terry might come back any second, and the only thing Mickey really wants is to be as far away from here as possible when he does. 

Actually getting off the couch is the hardest part. He takes it slow, doesn’t move his head until he absolutely has to, and once he’s standing things get a little easier. First stop: the pills on his nightstand. He only wants them now so he can accomplish everything else he has to do. Just wants, not needs. 

He takes two.

Still, there’s more feelings when he picks up his and Ian’s clothes. Enough to make his eyes water, but he doesn’t give in. When he remembers the way Ian held him last night, he replaces it with pictures of Kash, of Ned, of every time Ian has ever pushed him too far and asked him for too much. Anger is so much easier to deal with, and it keeps him moving while he puts the baking tray they had eaten pizza rolls off of into the sink and ejects the dvd so he can pop it back into its case. The toy he bought in another life, for a different version of himself to enjoy, goes into the trash where it always belonged.

All that talk about love and he had let himself fall right into it. Again. Ian is just running a game; his own game, unique to him, but still just a game. Somewhere, Mickey had known it too. It’s always the same no matter who the person is. They get you to feel something because that’s how  _ they _ feel something, and then before you know it punches are being thrown and the easy life you have gets replaced by one that’s so much harder. With so many more pieces all waiting to fall to the ground and shatter. 

What a stupid fucking trick to fall for twice.

He thinks about taking Ian’s clothes out to the trash too, then tucks them into the dresser with the rest of his own instead. 

His desire to leave the house, to get far away before Terry comes back, has diminished once he’s cleaned everything up. He strips the sheets off the bed and lays down right on the mattress; doesn’t want to risk laying on anything that smells like Ian. He’s been ignoring his limp, his blurry vision, the way his legs gave out in the kitchen and he had to grab the counter to keep from dropping to the floor while he cleaned. Now there’s nothing to distract him from feeling it all. 

The pain, as it turns out, is the easy part. His thoughts are more treacherous. If he could find those pills Joey gave him, the ones that had knocked him into something that was more like oblivion than sleep, he would take a fistful. But he settles for the whiskey from his nightstand instead.

It’s a bad combination with the pills he’s already taken. He hasn’t eaten since last night, and now he can add his rolling gut to the list of things making him miserable. Still, he doesn’t fall asleep. 

When the front door opens, he curls himself into a ball on the mattress but can’t make himself move any more than that. His bedroom door opens, and he wraps his arms tighter around his head. The mess is cleaned; he hasn’t done anything else wrong. 

He should have left when he had the chance.

“Did I leave my-” Mandy comes into his room like always, thinking about herself, but she trails off. When she speaks again, she sounds a little sympathetic at least.

“How bad is it?”

He shakes his head in his arms, but doesn’t move any more than that. She’ll leave; he just has to wait her out. She doesn’t. She goes to the bathroom and rummages around, then comes back out and squats by the bed but doesn’t touch him. 

“Stop stalling. You know the drill.”

_ Please just leave _

But still, she doesn’t. 

“Come on. You want it to get infected? Remember what happened to Iggy’s eye?”

He does: the pus, the smell, the weeks it had taken to clear up. Slowly, he uncurls so she can look at his face. His vision is so blurry in his right eye, he keeps them both closed because the doubling of images makes him feel even more nauseous. 

“There. That’s not so bad.” She says.

He can feel it when her hand comes close, but doesn’t pull away when she dabs something wet under his eye that makes his cheek sting.

“Didn’t piss myself.” He says while she continues to wipe his face, and it makes her laugh a little. 

“Well, that’s good. Did you lose any teeth? Open up.”

He almost doesn’t want to know, but ignores the ache in his jaw and opens his mouth so she can check. 

“Nah, looks good. Except your cheek, damn. What happened? Swish and spit.”

He has to sit up before he can take the plastic cup she offers. It’s saltwater and when he spits back into the cup, it comes out a very light pink. 

“Just Terry. Fucking pistol-whipped me.”

It feels a little better: saying it out loud.

They’ve reached the limit of her medical abilities, but she hands him a cigarette and holds a lighter near his mouth so he doesn’t have to try and light it with his trembling hands. 

“We need to get out of here.” She says after he’s taken a few drags. Inhaling makes his cheek sting, but it’s a drop in the bucket compared to everything else. “This isn’t normal. People don’t live like this.”

“If you want to be normal, Mands, just leave. Go live with the fucking Gallaghers and pop out a few kids. Doubt they’d even fuckin’ notice.”

He’s not angry at her, just angry, but as usual it doesn’t make much of a difference when she’s the one he takes it out on. She glares at him.

“What’d you do to piss him off so much anyway?”

“None of your fucking business.”

“Fuck you, Mickey. I’m just trying to help.”

“When are you going to realize, no one wants your fucking help?”

He’s definitely said worse things to her, but you wouldn’t know it by the look on her face.

“You know what?  _ Screw you _ . Enjoy your life with Terry. Getting the shit beaten out of you whenever he feels like it. It’s exactly what you deserve.”

She knocks the cup of salt water out of his hand and it splashes onto the mattress. For one horrible second, he gets the strong urge to hit her. To slap her across the face just like Terry would if she tried that shit with him, but it passes as quickly as it came and she leaves the room, slamming the door behind her.

His ears are ringing, his head is like one of the school computers, overheating and trying to run obsolete programming on a full hard drive, his right eye won’t stay open even when he tries. The Oxy has dulled the pain in his ass, but the leg below doesn’t want to support his weight. The next time the front door opens it will be Terry, but he can’t leave now. Let Mandy search for her normal life away from here. All Mickey wants to do is drink and pretend everything is going to be okay, and maybe also sleep; if his body will let him. 

He does this for days until he loses track of how many it’s been. Terry comes home the next day, but doesn’t check in on Mickey. For his part, Mickey never leaves his room until the sky is dark and the house is quiet. Even then, it’s only to find things to eat. He drinks from the faucet in the bathroom and sleeps pretty much the rest of the time. 

As soon as he can see out of both eyes, think more clearly, and walk without stumbling every few steps, he leaves. Everything he needs - his gun, ammo, cigarettes, money, pills - he puts in his backpack, and then just leaves out the front when everyone else is sleeping. He boards the L mostly because, after walking a few blocks, he needs to sit back down, and takes his first trip of many that night around the city.

By the time he makes it to O’Hare he’s laying on his side, using his backpack as a pillow and staring out the far window above a business woman’s head. She’s looking down at her laptop with a stern face and hasn’t taken any notice of him. When the train comes to a stop outside the airport, she gathers up her things briskly and walks out the sliding door. Her spot is taken by a young boy with a Spiderman backpack who’s more interested in looking out the window himself than at Mickey. 

Hours go by as he lays slouched over on the seat. He’s not sure how many loops he does, but he begins to take note of landmarks as he sees them again and again. The brick clocktower that’s too dark to read, the bend in the tracks where they sometimes pass right next to other train cars, the short trips on bridges that pass above the water. 

What he should do is leave. Get off this train and walk and walk until this city is behind him forever. A small part of him wants to do just that, and every time the doors open with a hiss and shut again he tries to make himself get up. Get up, off the train, and just go. 

He never does; the part of him that wants to go is drowned out by the parts of him that want to stay. To stay in his home, this city that he knows, and it might not ever get bad enough here that he  _ actually _ wants to go. He might spend his entire life in this city because, deep down, he’s too afraid to leave.

Mostly tonight he’s just tired. 

The restless part of himself has no luck convincing his body to disembark at any of the stops until two cops, young and uniformed, get on the train and sit only a few seats down from him. They’re talking to each other and don’t look over, but he sits up anyways and brings his backpack onto his lap. His hood is pulled low at least, covering most of his face.

Three stops go by, and still the cops don’t get off. At the forth, Mickey finally decides to disembark himself, only to look around when he gets off and see he’s come right back to where he started from. If he goes down the stairs to his left, he’ll be able to look across the street and see the Kash-and-Grab. All around him people are going about their business, getting on and off the train, and Mickey just wants to scream at them. 

The train leaves and he’s still standing on the platform, unsure of what to do next, unwilling to go home yet.

He winds up at the burned-out, fenced off block he and Ian used to pretend was theirs. He doesn’t feel like he’s the one making decisions for himself anymore; it’s as though he’s running around inside his own mind while something else tells his body what to do. It should scare him, but mostly the freedom not to think is nice.

Ian isn’t here and Mickey doesn’t have to force himself to be relieved by that. He really is. For the first time since he met Ian, he feels the same way about him as everyone else. He just wants to be alone.

The building they once navigated in the dark to see the stars is to his right, but he doesn’t want to go anywhere near it in the same way he hadn’t wanted to lay on the sheets he and Ian had slept in. Instead, he picks a different building to explore. There are more empty windows in this one, and the stairs are exposed in the main foyer so he won't need a flashlight to climb them. 

The top floor isn’t an open roof. There’s another room built onto it. Made from concrete walls and a deteriorating wood roof: it looks like it used to be some kind of chapel. He’s too exhausted to explore it in the early morning light, and sits on the floor in the ash and dust staring up at the ceiling instead. Whatever furniture that had once been here is gone now, and the circular windows stand empty. 

Mickey’s never given two shits about religion, but something about this room does feel different from the other abandoned buildings. The air is so still and fairly warm here on the top floor. 

It’s uncomfortable stretching out. Not physically - more of an abstract sense of fear - and he winds up with his back against the wall, knees pulled up to his chest to keep his stomach covered. 

He does some target practice from that position, smokes, takes a few more pills when a ghost of the pain creeps up again, but mostly he just sits and stares around the abandoned holy place. Thinking with no investment in what he’s thinking about. Doing his best to forget by burying everything bad under layers of inconsequential. Keeping all the fear and pain and panic deep down where it can’t bother him anymore. 

What he’s really thinking about is the sound the gun makes when it fires, the way it kicks back against the palm of his hand, and how the smell of gunpowder is slowly replacing years of dusty neglect around him. 

If he tried to sleep, it would have been too difficult. It’s just him, alone, in this chapel where no one has prayed for many years. He doesn’t try though. Exactly the opposite: he does his best to stay awake, to watch the sun slowly rising through the empty windows. Eventually his chin starts resting against his chest, and his eyes fall closed of their own accord. 

*-*-*

He wakes up on the dirty ground, still feeling like shit, but thinking more clearly than he had been after all those blurry nights and days on his bed. It’s nice to smell something that isn’t his bedroom, to wake up and see something different above him. Sleeping on the concrete has left him feeling stiff, but that’s not much different from how he’s been feeling for days now. 

He’s still mad at himself, for letting things get so out of hand, and at Ian for always pushing him to it, but the memories of what happened are quieter now compared to the clamor they’ve been making in his head for days.

He goes to the store to get food, liquor, more cigarettes. With his hood up, he feels okay. All he needed was a little time, and distance, to put things in perspective. He still has no idea what he’s going to do next, but right now he’s feeling good enough to eat actual food, to stretch out instead of curl up, and that’s enough for today. He goes back to the husk of a chapel to do more target practice, but it doesn’t feel like it had in the early morning. It’s much hotter up here now, and the bright sun exposes it for what it really is. Just a couple of concrete walls covered in mold and graffiti. Someone has drawn a cross on the far wall, and he shoots at it without feeling even slightly sacrilegious. 

There are no gods here. 

He almost expects it when Ian shows up. That’s how it’s always been: he does his best to get a handle on things, and then Ian shows up and knocks it all over. 

This time it’s different because now there is no secret part of him that wants to talk to Ian. It’s not just himself he’s angry at, and when Ian gives up trying to talk and leaves, Mickey feels nothing. Not even relief; just nothing.

It’s over. What could they possibly have to say to each other now? 

The chapel feels less safe after that. If Ian can find him here, he might come back and try to talk again. 

Mickey doesn’t want to talk to anyone right now. 

He’s out of pills. He noticed after he woke up and took the last two and, while nothing in particular hurts right now, the pain can always come back. He doesn’t want to risk his headache coming back and spoiling his badly needed - more or less indifferent - mood. Once a good mood is spoiled, it takes so much more effort to get it back than it does to just maintain it. 

There’s another voice in his head now too. The one that’s been making decisions for him, the one that brought him here, and that voice is telling him he should definitely go get more pills - or at least some weed - before he finds out what his sober mind has to say about everything. Mickey doesn’t have to question that, he’s already certain he doesn’t want to know. 

Without Terry’s connections, without his help, Mickey wouldn't know where to look for someone willing to sell to him in the light of day, and he doesn’t want to wind up at some random trap house. He’s not there yet.

_ Ever _

But what is he supposed to do if he can’t go home? 

Actually he does know someone else in the neighborhood. Someone who probably has weed, and - maybe - a little goodwill towards him too. 

*-*-*

It’s not Angie, but her little brother who answers the door. Mickey thinks briefly that if she isn’t home, he could just have the kid show him to her room, take whatever weed she’s got, and leave again without trouble. She is home, and he immediately feels like a douchebag for thinking that way, but gets some of his karma back when he lets the boy hold his hand and lead him to her bedroom door. The door is closed today so he knocks, and the kid wanders away distracted by the noise coming from the TV. 

Angie knew him when he was a dirty kid, recognized him when he was fresh out of Juvie and had a beard, but today she does a double-take before saying his name. He hasn’t seen a mirror in over a week, and can’t really guess what it is that’s tripping her up right now, but her concern is a double-edged sword; he does want to be let in, but he doesn’t want to have to explain what happened, where he’s been, or why he probably smells like the underside of a dumpster.

She doesn’t push him on what happened, but she does make him shower before she lets him sit on her bed. While he’s washing grime out of his hair, she puts his clothes in the dryer with some fabric softener so when he gets out they’re warm and smell like fresh linen. 

He’s really never done anything in his life to deserve it, but maybe some people are just like that: nice, even when everyone else around them act like complete assholes. Maybe it’s just not as big of a deal as he’s thinking, to take someone in for a night when they have nowhere else to go. Probably he’s just the asshole. Because, if their positions were reversed, he can’t really imagine extending her the same courtesy. 

Not that anyone’s ever asked to crash at his place. Well, except Ian and look how that turned out. 

He’s not hungry, but takes her up on her offer to smoke him out - which is why he came here in the first place anyway - and, when he’s finally high enough his mind stops pestering him, he stands by her window and looks out. 

She pulls herself up onto the bed and watches him for a few minutes before speaking. 

“I was talking to Suzy this morning,” She says. Suzy York is Iggy’s baby mama, but Mickey had no idea she knew Angie. Actually, now that he’s thinking about it, he has no idea how old Susan is at all. Was she in their class at school? But that would mean she was just fifteen when Iggy had knocked her up and…

And nothing. What’s the point of doing the math? It won’t change anything. He’s starting to feel that lethargy again; like there’s no point to any of this, and there never has been, but he owes Angie too much now, to just check out while she’s talking. 

“She said Iggy was out looking for you last night. Something about...I don’t know.”

Hearing that is like a punch to the gut, but Angie seems reluctant to discuss whatever reason Iggy gave for trying to hunt him down without hearing his input first.

He tries to respond, but can’t think of anything to say. More than that, he can’t seem to get his mind to even try and think of anything to say; it remains stubbornly blank while Angie watches him and waits. Finally, she says:

“You can crash here, for a bit. If you want.”

*-*-*

He ends up staying two nights before deciding it’s time to go home. On the third day he wakes up in Angie’s bed just like the previous morning - it’s big enough for the both of them and even in sleep she doesn’t encroach on his side - feeling better than any of the days since it happened. What he needed wasn’t pills or weed; it was sleep. 

It’s early and the house is quiet as he rinses his face in the bathroom sink. Angie’s father is a deadbeat - off somewhere with a new family, or maybe just alone - and her mother is a real connoisseur of pills herself, with many years of experience. She seems about as interested in his presence in the house as she is in whatever the boy - Brian - gets up to when he’s not watching TV. Which is to say, not at all. Angie doesn’t talk about any of it much, she certainly doesn’t go on about Brian the way Ian would about Debbie and Liam, but Mickey’s seen enough during his stay here to understand.

Actually, he feels like he understands a lot more about the world as a whole today than he did just a week ago.

He’s been thinking about Ian a lot. Worrying about him. He’s glad now, that Ian found him in the chapel. At least Mickey knows he’s okay. It was so stupid, inviting him home. The whole time he was convincing himself he was better than the guys at the group home, but he’s the same. Maybe worse. Ian had gotten out alive, but it had been a close call and the next time Terry might not be so sober. Might not have so many qualms about killing a neighborhood kid. 

Mickey won’t ever let something like that happen again.

His reflection in the mirror is a lot better now too. Infinitely better than when Mandy found him curled up on the bed, and even a slight improvement over his first night here. The bruises on his face are starting to yellow and in a few days will begin to slowly fade. His eye isn’t swollen shut anymore, and the one cut that hasn’t already healed over shows no signs of being infected. His butt isn’t bad either. Despite the pain that day, none of the bullet wounds reopened, and those bruises are also fading. In another week or so, all of it will be gone. No sign at all anything happened to him. 

It’s for the best, and a good sign that it’s time for him to go home. 

Outside of Angie’s bedroom is the only world he’s ever known. All the stores he’s ever shopped at, the L, the neighborhood bars and liquor stores. Somewhere out there is Mandy, probably getting herself into trouble. Ian too, and they can never go back to before but does Mickey really want to leave him behind? No. Of course not. His brothers. All his things. All of it in the Yards, and it’s time for him to man up, get it over with, and go home. 

Angie will understand. 

He doesn’t wake her up, but he does take the cash he’s been saving out of his backpack and leaves a grand of it on her nightstand. It’s not a thank you. It’s just, she deserves it. That’s better anyways; at least Mickey thinks so. 

As it turns out, his generosity towards Angie that day is the only good decision he makes for a long time. By the end of next month, the rest of the money he worked so hard to save will be gone. Not for an apartment, but on a wedding he doesn’t want, to a woman he can’t stand. 

In the end, Mickey spent his last year as a minor busting his ass for a dream that was never going to come true. On that at least, he’s not alone.

*-*-*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can't promise that the next few chapters are going to be any happier, but it does get better for them!! Also thank you for your comments and support! I love these characters and I know y'all do to :)


	6. A Promise Is A Ball And Chain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mickey's woes continue as he is confronted by Svetlana and agrees to marry her. At the wedding, Ian makes his conditions clear but Mickey thinks he can get away with ignoring them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More sad Mickey in this chapter, but it won't be like that forever!

Season 3; Chapter 6: A promise is a ball and chain

Mickey makes it all the way to the front porch of the house before thinking this is a very bad idea and realizing the urge to turn around and get the hell out of here might be insurmountable. He’s already inside the fence, up the stairs, but can’t make himself reach out and open the door.

This is his house; he belongs here and can come and go as he pleases.

Except, Terry knows; not suspects or worries. There won’t be any teasing or passing comments. Mickey wasn’t caught looking too long at a men’s underwear ad. He didn’t try to pull off a pink shirt, or say something that struck his father as overly feminine. He’s not a  _ fag _ (ha ha). He’s just genuinely gay, forever, and that alone should be enough to tell him he’s not welcome here anymore. 

It’s either this or he’s on his own.

He’s never been on his own before.

When he finally finds the willpower to open the door, Iggy and Joey are playing video games on the couch. It’s another blow directly to his psyche. This time it’s nostalgia, a deep and overwhelmingly strong desire to sit next to them and be  _ a part _ of what they’re doing, mixed with a more vague sense of revulsion that makes him want - just as strongly - to turn around and leave again without looking back. Instead of doing either of those things, he stands next to the open door, paralyzed, waiting for anyone to tell him what to do. 

Iggy looks up from the TV and smiles when he sees him. 

“Look who finally decided to show up.” 

His smile doesn’t look welcoming, it looks gratified; as though Mickey’s return has given Iggy something he wanted. Mickey’s seen that look before - when it’s his, or Tony’s, or Joey’s time to take the brunt of Terry’s anger, and Iggy’s turn to watch - but he can’t remember ever feeling so disgusted by it. He says nothing to either of his brothers and goes straight to his room instead. 

Someone’s tossed the place.

The couch cushions, his mattress, every drawer of his dresser. All his things scattered across the floor, tipped and tilted over. The contents of his nightstand have been dumped onto the underside of his bare mattress, which has been taken off the frame and left on the floor, and beneath the sportsman magazines, lighters, and rolling papers, is a pencil case he hasn’t seen in years. They really went all out trashing the place, and here it is - his whole life - spread out before him. It doesn’t look like much.

“Iggy kind of went overboard.” Joey says from behind him while Mickey just stares at the mess. It doesn’t make him jump; he’s too fatigued to startle. “But remember how dad was, when he found out about Suz? Guess he just, figured it’s about time one of us fucked up instead.” 

Mickey’s mind is a blank slate. One long, endless dial-tone. He stays silent.

“We were trying to figure out where you went, is all.”

With his foot, Mickey lifts one side of the mattress and the scattered contents of his nightstand fall off it onto the floor. That done, he leans over to pick it up and flips it back onto its metal stand. Now he can lay down on it, on his back, and bring his hands up to rub at his eyes where a headache is starting to build just behind them.

“It’s not something you can run from,” Joey continues, starting to sound more frustrated the longer Mickey goes without responding. “She came around to talk to Terry. A nice girl too, and you’re the one who fucked up so you deal with it!”

If Mickey was really listening, he might have asked for some clarification at this point, but the sounds his brother is making barely register as words; let alone ones with any meaning. If he had asked his brother just what the fuck he thinks is going on exactly, maybe he could have gotten ahead of everything before it all got so out of hand, but he doesn’t, and Joey - convinced now he’s not going to get a response - leaves Mickey alone with his scattered things. 

*-*-*

He’s not really sleeping - just laying motionless on the bed with his eyes closed, hands still pressed to his temple - so he hears it when Terry comes home, and he hears Iggy tell him that he, Mickey, is home, and hears his father’s footsteps through the living room and hallway all the way until they come to a stop, just inside his door.

For a second Terry says nothing, and, aside from breathing, Mickey doesn’t move.

“Clean this shit up. Get washed. We’re having company.”

That’s all Terry says. Then he walks away, and when Mickey’s certain he’s gone, he gets off the mattress and starts to pick things up. First, the drawers of his dresser back into their slots. Then the couch cushions, then the clothes, magazines, papers, and other assorted nick-nacks. When it’s all more or less off the floor and back in its place, he sits on the couch with his backpack in his lap and looks out the window; still not really thinking about anything at all.

The next person to come to his door is Iggy; Mickey’s really popular today.

“Get in the shower. They’re gonna be here soon.”

“Fuck off.”

Mickey can tell by the look on his brother’s face, that’s exactly what he was hoping to hear.

“Not funny is it? When it’s you.”

“The fuck are you talking about?” 

But Iggy just smiles.

“Want some help?”

He doesn’t. He’s not going to shower and he sure as shit isn't meeting any company. If Terry’s got a job to pull, he can do it without Mickey’s help.

But Iggy disagrees. He grabs Mickey by the hair in a grip loose enough not to hurt yet, but which threatens to become a yank if he doesn’t stand up before Iggy loses his patience.

“Get the fuck off me!” 

“Grow the fuck up and take care of your shit. I’m sick of covering for you.”

After what feels like an eternity of lethargy, Mickey’s starting to feel the familiar burn of anger in his chest. Unfortunately, it’s too late to win this argument. He has to drop his backpack and stand up, his hands covering his brother’s on his hair in an attempt to keep him from pulling too hard, and he ends up following Iggy into the bathroom after all.

Still holding Mickey’s hair in a grip that makes it clear he’s not fucking around, Iggy fiddles with the tub faucet until there’s water coming out of the shower head. 

“Do it yourself, or I’ll hold you under there.” It’s unclear if Iggy’s imitating their father on purpose or unconsciously. 

Iggy stays and watches him strip down while the water heats up; it’s like being inside all over again. 

“Wanna do a cavity search too?”

“Shut the fuck up, man. I had better shit to do today.”

The water is warm when he gets in. He stands below it unmoving for a minute, letting it run over his face and hair, washing away the last traces of the scent from Angie’s room: citrus perfume and weed. Despite whatever’s waiting for him on the other side, this feels amazing. Mandy is either still staying here, or plans on coming back, because her soap and shampoo bottles are here. He uses one, and when he gets out and towels himself off he smells like her instead. 

He didn’t really expect coming home to be easy, but there was a part of him that hoped; hoped that Terry would be over whatever it is he thought he saw and onto his next bender, and that nothing would be different. It was that hope that convinced him to come back, and now he’s going to pay the price for it. Better then, to just get it over with.

His bedroom is empty when he gets out, but someone’s left clean clothes - a pair of black slacks and a black t-shirt - on his bed. They’re not his, but are more-or-less his size. Maybe Tony’s. Not that it matters; he’s obviously meant to put them on, so he does. 

The bedroom window is shut, but it’d be easy to open it. Open it slowly, quietly, and drop right out without making a sound. Then he’d be exactly where he started this morning, with nothing, and he’s come so far now. He’s angry with Iggy, sure, but now he’s clean and Terry wants him - for something - and his brothers are talking to him at least, and he’s  _ here _ , goddammit. Home; where he belongs. What could possibly be waiting for him on the other side of his door that’s worse than leaving home behind?

He really has no idea, but by the time he finds out, it’s too late to turn around and decide to leave instead. Literally. The second he comes out of the hallway and sees that same woman from the other day sitting at the dining room table, Terry gets up from where he’s been leaning against the arm of the couch, grabs his arm, and brings Mickey over to the table where a chair’s been pulled out for him. __

Terry takes a seat at the head of the table. Iggy and Joey are nowhere to be seen; maybe they really did have better shit to do today. His father and the woman are talking, but Mickey doesn’t bother to listen. There’s a man at the table Mickey doesn’t recognize (the one time he saw him - working the counter at the rub ‘n tug - didn’t really make an impression) and another one leaning against the kitchen counter, that he’s really never met before, drinking a beer. Neither of them say anything to him.

He should probably feel more curious about all of this, but finds himself staring at the patterns of the wood grain on the table instead. One pattern near his hand might be a wolf stalking through reeds. Towards the middle of the table is a zeppelin, or maybe a shark. Below the table, a small foot comes to rest on his and presses down lightly in a secretive gesture. It’s the woman, the one that fucked him while Terry watched, she’s sitting on his left in the seat closest to his. He looks up when he feels her foot and meets her eyes. 

She’s either pissed or just always looks that way, he can’t remember ever seeing her face without that coldness plastered all over it. They glare at each other silently while Terry and the other men talk. 

If she really is so angry all the time, Mickey can help her with that. One bullet and he could take all her worries away. He’ll go into his room, open his backpack, grab his gun, and blow her brains out all over the floor and walls. Then he won’t ever have to worry about walking into a room and seeing her again. She’ll just be gone, and it’d be so easy to do. One bullet. 

He can picture it - the sound it would make, the blood, the look on his father’s face - so well it almost feels like he’s already done it.

_ What the fuck? _

He’s not going to kill her. He’s going to sit here silently until this is over, until he’s allowed to leave again, and then he’ll find out what Terry wants from him in exchange for being allowed to stay. And if fucking this woman again is what it takes then…

Then every single person in this room is about to find out firsthand what happens when you push a Milkovich too far; Mickey included.

The table has fallen silent now, but it still takes him a few seconds to realize everyone is looking at him like they expect him to say something. The foot on his presses down more firmly. They’re all waiting but he hasn’t been listening, and has nothing to add. 

The silence stretches out.

Finally, the man sitting at the table breaks it. He says ‘Mikhailo Milkovich’ in his thick Russian accent and for the first time Mickey hears it the way it’s supposed to sound. Not the way Terry says it or anything like his mother, a native born Chicagoan, used to, and it makes him listen. 

“This is good news. You’re lucky to have a woman such as Svetlana. She will make a perfect wife.”

“Who’s Svetlana?”

The foot on top of his presses down harder, and when Mickey’s finally had enough and pulls away, the woman next to him lets out a forced laugh. “See. Like I say, he is funny.”

But the man doesn’t seem convinced. He looks from her to Terry and back again. Then exchanges a few words in Russian with the man in the kitchen, and the woman pushes her chair back from the table and stands up. She gestures at him to follow her and, after a moment of hesitation, Mickey does. Over towards the front door, where they can still be seen at the table but can speak lowly without being overheard.

“I am Svetlana. Have you not been listening? Do you not understand?”

“No I don’t fucking understand anything that’s going on.” Mickey doesn’t bother to whisper and Svetlana grabs his arm no longer looking indifferent. She looks kind of scared.

“Please. Listen to me. I will explain.” She leans close again to whisper. “I have told them that the child can be no one else's. That day...what we did is not usually my job, but I am pregnant.”

_ Pregnant.  _ Unlike everything else said at the table, that word isn’t meaningless to him. Like the punchline of a joke, it both brings clarity to everything that came before it and also kind of makes him want to laugh. If he did - laugh, that is - it wouldn’t sound anything like him. It would be a hollow, cruel sound and, though Svetlana doesn’t know it, they both wait in silence for a few seconds to see if he’s going to.

He doesn’t, the urge passes, and she continues to wait for him to pull an answer to that absurd statement out of his ass. 

“If you're pregnant,” Mickey whispers back, infected by her conspiratorial tone, “Then it’s not mine.” 

Okay. He’s not a woman. What he knows about periods, pregnancies, and babies could be written on a single tampon with a sharpie, but he doesn’t have to be a goddamn OB-GYN to know that whatever load knocked this bitch up, it wasn’t his. 

“Why would we tell anyone this baby is not yours? Should I tell them I can’t please you too?” She looks nervously over at the table, then back to him. “Maybe man who is father is married. Some men, see me in secret, and if they knew, they make me get rid of it. Please, Mikhailo Milkovich, you must help me. Then, I help you.”

Mickey doesn’t like being told what to do by this woman who might be the only person in the neighborhood with more problems than him, but she looks deathly serious. Imagining killing her is one thing, but the idea of someone forcing her to get rid of her baby is a little too real with those men across the room watching them closely. 

“I can’t help you. You saw...you were there. My dad fucking hates me.”

“I have been speaking to your father. He does not hate you, he wants us to get married. Promised me the biggest room in the house, and said he will pay for whole wedding.”

Mickey considers. Over at the table, Terry is watching them too. This is what he wanted Mickey to get cleaned up for. It’s not a job, it’s... 

He closes his eyes and tries to remember a time when his life made sense.

“We will help each other. It’s Mickey, yes?” He nods. “Mickey, tell them that the child is yours and you will marry me, and I will tell your father what a good husband you are. Give him grandchild.”

“Okay.”

She looks at him, suspicious maybe of his easy acceptance, but Mickey has nothing to hide. Terry’s been pushing the idea of marriage for more than a year now, and maybe if he’d thought about it, Mickey could have assumed that would be the price he had to pay after what Terry saw. How better to erase the past, than by taking that final step and lifting Mickey above suspicion forever? He’s even got it all lined up. No elaborate proposal, no ring shopping, hell he doesn’t even have to knock her up. This woman, Svetlana, is a one-stop-shop for everything he needs. 

“Okay,” She repeats. Then leans over like she’s going to kiss him on the cheek, but he pulls away and she doesn’t try again. 

“Okay.” He says again for lack of a better response, and they both go to sit back down. 

“Thank you for giving us chance to talk,” She says to the other people at the table, “He did not know about baby, but is very excited, and has asked to marry me.” 

A part of him is still laying in bed with Ian. Another part on Angie’s bed. Had he ever gotten out of the shower? Who are these people sitting at his dining room table talking about weddings?

The man in the kitchen starts clapping suddenly in a celebratory rhythm and it startles him. Too out of place to keep up with any of this, Mickey looks to his father for guidance. If Terry’s still angry, then it’s the secret kind of anger. The kind that can wait until company is gone.

“There will be a big wedding - all the girls will plan, of course - and your sister too. Your father has told me much about her.”

She seems like she has more to say, but before she can continue, Terry slaps his hand down onto the table making Mickey jerk back in surprise and knock his knees into Svetlana’s under the table. When he looks over again, Terry is smiling.

“Drinks!” He shouts excitedly. “My boy is getting married!”

*-*-*

That night, Terry pours Mickey’s drinks. Just beer until Joey comes back with champagne, but Terry’s never gotten him so much as a soda since Mickey was old enough to walk to the fridge himself. Tonight, his father keeps his glass full. His cousins show up, his brothers, their girlfriends, but no Mandy. Terry invites all his friends too, and they all seem to want to give him the exact same pat on his back to say congratulations. 

Svetlana stays for the party too, and uses Mickey’s intoxication to invite herself to stay in his room full-time from now on. She never mentions where she was staying before, but if the idea of sleeping on his stained mattress is an upgrade to her, Mickey’s not sure he wants to know. 

All of this is strange, to say the least, but also kind of gratifying. The truth is he started today at one of his lowest points ever, and now… Well, now he’s not exactly sure what’s going on, but it’s a hell of a lot better than where he had been. 

He doesn’t manage to sober up at any point of the night, but nothing that’s happening seems to require his input. He stays in the kitchen mostly, where the back door has been wedged open so cool air can come in, and from this angle he can’t quite see the living room couch which is just fine by him. Svetlana comes by every so often while she talks to other people, but she never stays to talk to him. The whole idea of marrying her seems so abstract, he can’t form much of an opinion on it at all. 

At least now Terry’s happy. 

That’s what matters. Terry, proud and happy. Looking him in the eye. Introducing him to people. Friends.  _ My son. _

_ This is a sham. _

Mickey’s outside now, under the moonlight and away from the chatter and music of the house. He came out here for a cigarette and some peace, and wound up hanging onto the chain link fence, throwing up into the weeds. 

He’s had too much to drink is all. 

He’s thinking about Ian again. 

This morning, he couldn’t have said with any amount of conviction what he wanted, but now that it’s too late, he knows. He wants to go back in time to the first day he met Ian and do it all over again. Every word. Every fuck. Every kiss. It’s easier to see now, how what they had was deteriorating the whole time they were together. Getting less and less stable every second. 

At least they had made the best of it. Pushed it too far, really, and now there’s nothing to go back to. Still, he would do it all over again if he could. 

Again, summoned from nowhere by the power of Mickey’s thoughts, a Gallagher appears, but it’s not the one he wants. It’s Lip, standing on the other side of the chain link, looking at him. 

“The fuck do you want?”

“Saw the lights,” Lip says, pointing towards the house. “Thought I might find you here. Ian’s been worried.”

At the sound of Ian’s name, Mickey decides to go back inside. He can already tell he doesn’t want to have this conversation. 

“Hey wait! Just talk to me for a second.”

Lip jumps the fence so he’s in the yard too and Mickey spins around to face him. 

“ _ What? _ ”

“Look, I get it. I don’t know you, or what’s been going on, but he’s worried. I don’t like to see him like this. Go talk to him. At the store, or he’s home now. Come back with me.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“What, that’s it?”

“Get the fuck out of my yard.”

“You want to act tough, fine. But you can’t just run away. Real men face their problems!” The last part he says to Mickey’s back and it forces him to turn around again. 

“Don’t tell me how to be a man!” He closes the distance between them so he can say the next part right to Lip’s face. “You want to help Ian? Keep him the fuck away from me."

Lips stares at him, looks around his face in the light of the moon and the street lamps. There’s plenty to see. Yellowing bruises, anger, red eyes, maybe even some left over vomit. Whatever he sees it makes him nod and back away. 

“Okay, Mickey.”

There’s plenty of hurtful things Lip could say, but few that would make much of an impression after the day Mickey’s had. Instead, he just walks away. Hops the fence and leaves. 

Mickey watches him go. Feeling tired, more sober, he sits down in the weeds and trash by the porch, draws his legs up, and lets his head hang. At first he thinks he’ll cry, but no tears come. There’s still so much anger, too much to feel any self-pity. What the fuck does Lip Gallagher know about him anyways? 

He lights another cigarette and when it’s done goes back inside.

*-*-*

Svetlana spends all the money he worked so hard to save. Instead of an apartment with Ian, he gets his room redecorated.  _ No Nazi shit _ , she says, and Mickey finds himself negotiating wall space for posters he barely cares about anyways. He just can’t stand to let her have everything.  _ I cannot sleep on this bed _ , she says, and Terry forces Joey to switch rooms with them so their new queen sized bed can fit.  _ There’s no room for my clothes _ , she says, and just like that his weights are delegated to a spot under the bed so all her things can fit into spaces of their own. The money she doesn’t spend on furniture and clothes goes to wedding planning. She comes over to the house several times to go over everything with Terry. Twice, Mandy gets involved too, but Mickey is thankfully exempt and makes himself scarce whenever it’s happening. 

The wedding itself isn’t that big of a deal. It’s the price he has to pay to live at home again, and he considers himself lucky that’s all Terry asks for. Svetlana is fine too. Not particularly pleasant to be around, but fine. She’s quiet most of the time, drinks more than him when she’s in the mood to, cooks for the family. Even though they share a bed, she only tried to come on to him the first few nights, but quit after he continued to rebuff her more and more forcefully each time. Now he sleeps on the edge of the bed - not his bed anymore,  _ their  _ bed - with his back to her, and tries not to imagine what it will be like as her belly gets bigger and they’re still stuck in this bed together. Eventually there will be a baby too, but he doesn’t like to think about that either. 

He starts working with Terry and his brother’s again, although the summer work is slow this year. He even takes a job from Mandy who said the Gallagher’s need someone intimidated; it goes terribly, and he doesn’t end up making any money from it. He’s as broke as ever, drinking just to fall asleep at night, but the upcoming wedding and baby have raised his standing in the family, and he can feel the difference. Not just with Terry, but his brothers and cousins as well. It’s nice. The opposite of what would have happened if things had gotten even more out of hand with Ian. 

Even without work, he keeps himself busy. Drinking and playing video games, popping Xanax and Oxy. Laying on his new bed and staring up at the ceiling until he starts to see shapes in the uneven plaster. Avoiding Svetlana by sitting on the back porch and chain smoking until he’s sure she must be asleep and it’s safe to crawl back into bed. 

He stays busy. 

Ian finds him again. Drunk on whisky and exhaustion. Hiding in one of the many abandoned buildings this city offers for it’s derelict population like a backwards social service they all get for not paying their taxes. How he finds him, Mickey doesn’t know. Maybe he’s combed the whole city, or maybe Mickey’s just more predictable than he likes to think. He can’t remember now, if he and Ian have come here before. 

Despite everything he knows about him, Mickey has been under the impression that Ian understands. That he understands it’s over, they’re done for good, but that isn’t the case. He doesn’t understand how stupid and full of pride Mickey had been, thinking he could protect them. Doesn’t understand that the biggest danger to them had been Mickey all along. 

All Ian understands is that this, them not being together,  _ hurts. _ It hurts Mickey too, but there are worse things in the world than heartbreak. 

Getting murdered is one. 

If Mickey saw a stray dog, sniffing around the broken bottles and poisoned rat traps below the porch, he'd give it a few hard kicks. Just enough to get the lesson across: it’s dangerous here, stay the fuck away. Mickey’s never had a dog; never even cared for a stray. How is he supposed to understand that some connections run so deep that someone would risk it - danger, the possibility of pain - just to come back to  _ him _ ?

Ian isn’t a stray dog and he isn't leaving, maybe he doesn’t understand that underneath Mickey’s foundation there’s nothing but traps and broken glass and poison. 

It'll be up to Mickey then, to explain to him in whatever way best gets the point across, that he needs to go away and stay away. He knows what he has to do, but just like all the other times they’ve been apart and gotten back together, there’s an impulsive voice in Mickey’s head saying they could fuck right now. Bang once and all the horrible, empty loneliness would be gone. Then they’d bang again and again until they wound up right back in the same situation again. Only next time they might not be so lucky. 

Ian smashes a bottle against the wall like he’s the only one who gives a shit this is happening, like he’s the one who has a right to be angry, and Mickey walks away from him because he’s weak and if he sticks around for even another second, he’ll give in. 

Mandy must have told him about the wedding because Ian follows him down the stairs yelling about it. Shouting at him to stop and talk, and it’s clear he’s not going to give up. So Mickey gives him a reason to stay away. It’s a gift, really. If Mickey’s learned anything from all this, it’s that anger is so much easier to deal with than sadness. 

“You wanna fag bash now? That make you feel like a man?” 

There’s that phrase again, but Mickey’s had plenty of time in the last month to grow up. To be a man. It’s Ian who doesn’t know what he’s talking about. 

“Go ahead! Do it!” Gallagher yells and Mickey already knows he’s going to, but Ian could have avoided all of this by just using his brain and staying away in the first place. 

Hitting him still sucks - like hitting Mandy or something - even if it is for his own good. It’s not like any of their other fights, because this time Gallagher’s not even trying to fight back. He’s just waiting; waiting for Mickey to make the final decision, and that makes this whole thing worse because it makes it seem like maybe Mickey  _ could  _ make a different decision. Ian wants to talk about being gay like it’s the opposite of being straight, like instead of Svetlana he could meet Ian at the end of the aisle. Hold  _ his _ hands and marry  _ him _ . 

But that isn’t how it works. That’s a fantasy, and if they both took the easy way out like Ian - ignored reality and continued to play house with each other while the world outside got wise to what was going on - then they’ll both end up dead. One of them has to put an end to this; one of them has to make sure they stop. Because he’s older maybe, or just less attached to the idea of romance, that person is going to be Mickey. 

Even if he’d rather be the one on the ground, begging. 

Even if he’s never going to forget the feeling of Ian’s chin connecting with his boot.

Even if he knows that a year from now, Gallagher will have moved on and will never bother to think about Mickey again. 

Mickey’s learned his lesson too: love is nothing but a curse.

*-*-*

He does feel a little better when it’s all over. When he doesn’t give in or go back on his promise to keep Ian away. As long as he doesn’t think too hard about hurting him. As long as he doesn’t think too hard about never being with him again. 

*-*-*

At home, it goes something like this: He works with Terry and his brothers like usual, mostly at night, then comes home. Svetlana asks him how everything went, he tells her it was fine, and in the silence that follows he remembers what it used to be like working with Ian at the Kash-and-Grab. When Svetlana sets a plate with food down in front of him at the table, Mickey doesn’t bother to ask her what it is. He eats it without comment and she eats hers in the same way. They eat, sleep, watch TV, and move around each other in silence. All the money he makes goes to her or Terry for the wedding, and all the time he thinks about Ian. 

At least Ian will stay away now; no sane person would come back after a beating like that. 

Of course, Mickey is back. Back at home, living with Terry. Keeping his mouth shut most of the time because his father’s good moods are only as permanent as the string of good luck that bring them on, and Mickey is less sure than ever of what will set him off.

The ache inside of him that feels equally like loneliness and loss doesn’t go away or get any better. Every day that passes and brings no relief with it forces Mickey to question himself. Ian is wrong: they can’t ever be together the way he and Svetlana are about to be publicly joined together. But maybe Mickey was wrong too. Maybe they can’t be apart either. It certainly doesn’t feel like this emptiness inside of him - cutting into his sleep and appetite and sanity - is sustainable. 

Maybe he just needs to get himself some better weed.

Three days before the wedding, Mandy comes into his new room while he’s lifting weights. She’s got a large, fabric bag with a hanger sticking out of it. When she lays it on the bed and unzips it, he sees there’s a tuxedo inside.

“Okay, wedding boy. Here it is.”

Mickey sets the weights down to walk over and look at it, but doesn’t take it out. 

“Try it on,” she says, “See if it fits.”

“Nah, I’m good. Looks fine.”

“That’s it?” They haven’t been getting along lately, and the presence of Svetlana, doing all the chores Mandy never wanted to do anyways, has only made things worse. “I spent all morning at the shop. You’re going to try it on, or I can take it back and you can marry that bitch naked.”

“What’s wrong with the clothes I have, anyway?”

His hoodie is well worn in, comfortable, sleeveless and perfect for the heat of a crowded dance hall. His jeans are practically brand new, or at least they were a few months ago. 

“Why’s everyone making such a big deal about this?” He says, still looking at the tuxedo; it looks uncomfortable. 

“Are you serious? What do you think marriage is, Mickey?”

“Just give me the fucking thing. I’ll try it on.”

She pulls the hanger out of the bag and hands the tux to him, then turns around so he can change into it. 

With her back to him, she says, “Why are you doing this? Who gives a shit that she’s pregnant? I just don’t… Suz was pregnant and Iggy didn’t marry her. If you do this, you’ll be just like dad. You’ll-”

“I can’t figure this out.”

“What’s so confusing about not throwing your life away for some whore.”

“The suit, Mands.”

She turns. He’s got the pants on, but nothing else is intuitive. Except the jacket, but he’s pretty sure that goes on last. 

“Ignore the bowtie for now.” She says holding the shirt out to him. “Do it up to the top button.”

He tries to pull the shirt on, takes it off again, unbuttons the cuffs, and finally gets it on. It’s not that bad, he just doesn’t want to have to wear it at all. 

“Why didn’t you tell Ian about the wedding?” Mandy asks while he does up the front buttons over his tank top. “You guys used to talk and now… he’s acting so weird about everything. I’m worried about him. I think he got into a fight the other day, but he won’t tell me about it.”

“I don’t want to talk about it. Play fucking house with the Gallagher’s all you want, but keep me out of it.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“It means I don’t want to hear his fucking name anymore.” It comes out sounding more angry than he intended. She’s doing up his cuffs, but stops after he snaps at her.

“”What is your problem, lately? If he came on to you or something, get over it. Ian is-”

“I said, don’t say that faggot’s name to me!”

Mandy slaps him in the face, hard enough to shut him up, and when he looks back at her she seems just as surprised by it as he is. 

“Congratulations, Mickey.” She says, her voice trembling. “ _ Now _ you’re just like dad.”

She leaves, and Mickey undoes the shirt one button at a time. He doesn’t need to try it on. If it fits, it fits. If it doesn’t, who gives a fuck?

*-*-*

It’s the morning of his wedding day, and Mickey barely slept at all the night before. He’s laying on his side, in bed, looking at his new nightstand and thinking. Too tired to get up and too restless to close his eyes. He can feel Svetlana on the other side of the bed, but her breathing is always too quiet to tell if she’s asleep or awake. 

Eventually, the alarm she’s set on her own nightstand goes off and she gets it after a few seconds, sighing and making the bed creak as she stretches. Mickey closes his eyes. Hopefully she’ll leave without making him get up too. 

“You want breakfast?” She asks quietly when she sits up. Maybe she has been awake this whole time, and maybe she knows he has been too. Mickey doesn’t answer. He keeps his eyes closed and waits for her to leave.

“I’ll bring it in to you. Wait.” She says despite his silence. Then, very gently, she touches his shoulder, but pulls her hand away when it makes him flinch.

He does wait, mostly because he still doesn’t have the energy to get up, and she comes back after twenty minutes with a plate of warm, diced potatoes and scrambled eggs. Fluffy and not too much salt, and nothing at all like how Mandy used to make them.

Mickey kind of misses Mandy’s runny eggs.

While he eats, he keeps thinking about Ian. It’s been worse, more consuming, since Mandy brought him up the other day. He’s gone from memories of the two of them together, to wondering what Ian is doing at any given moment, to actively daydreaming about him. Imagining that the two of them are together again. Picturing what they would do, where they would go. 

It’s the same trap he fell into in Juvie. If he doesn’t stop, it’s only going to get worse, but he just has to get through today. After that he’ll stop; after today, things will get better. 

After she cleans up, Svetlana helps him get dressed. She makes it through the whole ordeal without slapping him, and when they’re done she straightens his cuffs and says:

“You look very handsome.”

Then he helps her load her dress, also hidden in a fabric bag, and all the hair and makeup stuff she says she needs, into the car.

He drives her to the ‘spa’ she works at. When they get there, the parking lot is already full; not of cars, but the women she works with. All standing out in the early morning sun in their sandals and robes, curlers and towels in their hair, smoking and laughing and waiting for Svetlana, and they gather around as he slowly pulls the car into the lot. 

He gets out, thinking they might need him for something, but the women wave him off and unload the car in just one trip between them. 

It’s still hours before the ceremony, and all he has to do is make himself scarce until it’s time to show up, get married, then hopefully get so drunk he can forget all of this by the time the day is over. 

Svetlana comes around to the driver’s side and stops him before he can get back in the car. He doesn’t feel like looking at her right now, so he looks at the ground instead. 

“I will see you soon then, yes?” She asks.

“Yeah.”

“You will be there? You will not keep me waiting?”

“Mhmm.” 

He doesn’t appreciate the third degree this late in the game, but he did spend half the night thinking about not going through with this, so maybe she’s justified in asking.

“You promise.”

“I said I’ll be there.”

“Say you promise.”

“I promise.”

“Thank you, Mickey. I will make you happy. That, I promise. We will be a happy family.”

She touches her belly and Mickey’s eyes follow her hand even though her stomach is as flat as ever. This time, when she leans in, he lets her give him a light kiss on the cheek. They’re going to be married today after all. 

*-*-*

With nowhere else to go, he drives to the Kash-and-Grab and parks across the street. Watching and waiting. It’s nine now. Ian should have opened the store, but it sits dark and empty, closed sign facing out. Mickey just sits in the car and watches, thinking he’ll show up any minute.

There’s no way Ian will want to talk to him after their last encounter, but he decided last night that he’s going to try. If he can just see Ian one more time, explain everything, then maybe they  _ can _ go back. If not back to exactly how things used to be, then at least something like it. Terry is happy now, will be even happier after the kid is born, and, as long as he makes enough money, Svetlana won’t give a damn what he does with the rest of his time. 

He waits for two hours, but Ian never shows up. There’s still hours before the ceremony. He could drive by the Gallagher’s house, see if he can catch Ian there, but Terry knows that house. If he catches Mickey anywhere near it, he’ll blow a gasket.

Every time Ian’s found him, it’s been in one of their hiding spots around the city. Mickey starts at the school, where classes are in full swing now for the fall semester. The whole summer has slipped by, and he barely remembers half of it. Ian’s not under the bleachers. He’s not at the ball field where kids are already gathering for a Saturday afternoon game. Mickey gets the cuffs of his tux dirty climbing through the fence and over the rubble to check Ian’s obstacle course, but he’s not there either. 

By the time he’s checked every spot he can think of, and still no Ian, Mickey doesn’t have a choice. He has to head back and get married without seeing him again. Either that or find out what Terry will do to him if he’s late for his own wedding. 

When he gets to the hall, the parking lot is starting to fill up with cars. He sees Iggy’s old, blue Camaro towards the back, and parks next to it. Iggy and a few other men, Joey and Tony among them, are standing next to a trash can a few feet away, smoking. 

“Well, well, well.” Iggy calls out as soon as Mickey gets out of the car. “We were taking bets on whether you’d try to run or not.”

Seeing all these guys standing around, dressed in suits for  _ his _ wedding, is making Mickey feel even more nervous, and he doesn’t say anything as he walks up and lights his own cigarette. 

“Do you want some advice, little brother?” Iggy asks, and it sounds like he’s already hit the bottle at least once today. Mickey shrugs, and the advice Iggy gives him is to put his fingers up to his face in the shape of a V and wiggle his tongue between them. It doesn’t make Mickey feel any better.

Joey waves this off.

“Women can take care of themselves like that. Or each other.” He gives Mickey a wink and some of the other men laugh. Then he taps Mickey on the chest, just above his heart. “What they care about is what’s in here. They just want you to love ‘em, man.”

This advice doesn’t make him feel any better than Iggy’s had. 

Mickey’s still too anxious to talk, but the other guys take turns giving advice. All of it is either obscene or unhelpful, or both. Finally, a woman in a hideous pink dress shows up and takes a picture of them all standing there without warning. Everyone grumbles, but she’s persistent enough to get them all to stand in a line, with Mickey at the center, so she can take another one. 

At least she doesn’t ask him to smile. 

“Okay,” She says in a commanding voice, “Groom go in the back, you can’t see anything until it’s ready. Everyone else, go help finish setting up.”

She herds the other men away like a sheep dog with cattle, and Mickey’s the groom so he goes to the back to wait. 

It’s cool and dark and quiet in the backroom. There’s enough space to pace back and forth and clear out some of this nervous energy that’s threatening to swallow him whole. 

He can’t leave, he just can’t, but he wants to see Ian so badly that twice he walks towards the door thinking he will leave after all. Both times he chickens out, then Ian shows up anyways. Looking the same as always: better in person than Mickey can ever imagine in his daydreams. No bruises left from the last time they met. Still, he looks pissed and ready to fight or fuck; sometimes it’s difficult to tell with him. 

Mickey’s been thinking about this though, and he’s prepared to make an offer. One they can both live with. An offer to go back to the way things were. Kind of; not exactly. He knows they can’t go back to how it was that night, before everything went so wrong. What he’s really offering is to go back to the way it was at the beginning; back when they really were just hooking up. When sex was something they could get away with and then just go back to their regular lives, and there was no need to hide because what they were doing wasn’t that much different from what millions of married people do all the time. Just a little something on the side. Who could it hurt?

“Alright, look. Just because I’m getting hitched, doesn’t mean we can’t still bang.”

Maybe it’s not what Ian wants. Maybe he’d never agree to it straight out, and somewhere in the back of his mind Mickey knows that trying to trick him into it is wrong. Unless it works. Unless he reminds Ian how good just the basics are between them - _just the basics_ \- and then _holds firm_. When Ian comes to his door, when he says he wants Mickey to take him on a date, when he starts pushing that fantasy again that they’re a couple. Mickey will hold firm. They can have all of the good things and none of that extra shit. They can kiss all Ian wants, as long as it’s in secret, and if he has to let Ian believe it won’t be like that at first - just until he can remind him how good they are together, that’s it’s no one’s business what they do in secret - then he’ll do it. If that’s what it takes, he’ll do it. Gallagher will forgive him. 

“If you give half a shit about me,” Ian says in a much quieter voice than he had just used to remind Mickey he’s marrying a whore, “ _ Half.  _ Don’t do this.”

He does give a shit about Ian _and_ he has to do this, but Gallagher is here. He came back which means he can be persuaded to stay even after the ceremony is done and the paper is signed. Mickey just has to make him remember what’s so good about them in the first place, why they always end up back here together. Even after everything they’ve done to each other. 

Ten minutes. He has ten minutes to spare so he can convince Ian that everything will be okay. It’s  _ his  _ fucking wedding day after all. 

So, he kisses Ian. Not a peck, like their first kiss. That had been a real promise; a promise that Mickey was going to try, to commit, to work towards their future together. He can’t even remember what it had felt like to kiss Ian that day and actually believe all those things were possible. 

This kiss is a lie, and the entire point is to sell it so that Mickey can be in control again; so that he can have his cake and eat it too. 

Hardly his proudest moment as far as these things go, but that’s okay. There will be plenty of time to live this day, over and over again, in his mind, and his dreams, through the coming winter months.

There will be plenty of time to hate himself when this is all over.

But Ian seem’s determined not to do any of this Mickey’s way. He’s pushing them into the kitchen, pulling him back into an even rougher version of the kiss before Mickey’s had a chance to get his jacket all the way off, leaving his hands pinned behind his back. While he’s still struggling with his jacket, Ian’s hands come up to hold Mickey’s face still so he can bite his lip, hard. 

Finally the jacket is off and on the ground, and Mickey brings his hands up to push Ian back before he can leave any marks for Svetlana, or Terry, to see. It only lasts a second, then Ian is back, crowding him further into the kitchen. 

When Mickey tells him to calm down, he punches the industrial cabinet right next to his face, making the metal ring.

“So that’s it then? You were just going to forget about me after everything we’ve been through?”

Ian’s talking too loud - someone might hear - but asking him to quiet down right now doesn’t seem like a good idea. He goes in for another kiss instead, and, after a moment of tension, Ian relaxes into it. Mickey takes the opportunity to pull them even further into the kitchen and away from the door to the main space. 

It’s nothing like the other times they’ve made out; Ian is all teeth and grabbing hands that threaten to rip the tux if he’s not careful, and he doesn’t seem to be putting much effort into being careful. When they get to the far wall, Gallagher continues to push against him, pressing him back so tightly there’s barely enough room for either of their chests to move as they breathe. 

One of Ian’s knees forces itself between Mickey’s legs, and the sudden pressure on his crotch is heavy and amazing. He hasn’t jerked-off in so long, he can’t even remember when the last time was. Sharing a room with Svetlana, there just never seems like a good time. Now Ian’s tongue is in his ear, his hand wrapped around Mickey’s thigh and pulling his leg up, and there’s no question that  _ this _ is what Mickey wants. 

It’s not quite enough, not like this, and they don’t have time to waste. His first attempt to push Ian away, so he can turn around and they can fuck already, is rebuffed. Instead, Ian lets go of his leg and grabs him by the wrists, pinning them to the wall at head height. Most of the time when they wrestle, especially when it’s like this, they’re just playing, but it doesn’t feel like Ian’s playing today.

“I don’t understand why you won’t just admit you want me.” Ian says quietly, resting their foreheads together. 

“Okay, I admit it. Can we bang now?” Mickey says and it makes Ian frown. 

“You’re such a dick.” 

“Let go. I’ll make it up to you.”

“Blow me.”

“Okay. Let me go, and I will.”

Ian looks away. Not at anything in particular, just away from Mickey. He looks unhappy, but no one’s asking him to smile either. They just have to make it through today and then everything will be better. He lets go and says nothing while Mickey gets down on his knees between him and the wall. 

Mickey doesn’t mess around - there’s no time even if he wanted to - just undoes Ian’s pants, pulls them and his boxers down too. Mickey can feel him watching from above as he licks his lips, getting ready. Ian rests his forearms against the wall and leans forward, boxing Mickey in from above, blocking the kitchen light, and casting a shadow over him. Now there’s a hand on his head, tugging at his hair, egging him on. He takes Ian in his mouth and looks up to watch the way his eyes close. 

Mickey blows him like he’s missed doing it, and he really has. He’s also missed jerking off, sex, kissing, being with Ian in general, and he gets the feeling Ian’s missed it all too. Especially when his hands clench in Mickey’s hair, or he thrusts forward a little too hard, too fast. 

He’s missed this so much. 

It turns him on feeling how hard Ian is when he wraps his hand around the base of his dick, and the way the tip of his cock feels sliding past his lips or brushing against his cheek where any cuts and bruises have long since healed. It turns him on to have Ian hovering above him, watching, making the occasional noise, especially when he does his best to relax and take him deep into the back of his throat.

Outside the double doors, in the main hall, people are tying up balloons with ribbons, taking their seats for the ceremony, and chatting excitedly to each other, but in here it’s just the two of them. Mickey on his knees, bobbing his head and trying not to think too much about how they have to hurry, and Ian, leaning against the wall and letting out soft moans and grunts when something feels just right. 

One of his hands comes down to Mickey’s hair and he uses it to hold his head in place while he starts thrusting. It’s not something Ian’s done before, but he backs off before it becomes too much, before he can start to gag, even when Mickey kind of wishes he wouldn’t. The hand disappears entirely just before Ian gasps out, “I’m close.”

There’s no rags to clean up with, no extra clothes to change into, and even if there was Mickey would probably still swallow because that’s half the fun of doing this. Ian’s stomach clenches and his head bows even lower, and he says Mickey’s name in that perfect, breathless way no one else can replicate. Then he comes in Mickey’s mouth, each shudder of his body accompanied by another small gasp from Ian who’s shaking a little by the time Mickey pulls off and wipes his lips. 

“Feel better?” Mickey asks, thinking about how pissed Ian had seemed when he first came back here and not at all about the last time they met - when he had kicked Ian in the jaw so hard he can still hear the sound he lets himself think about it - until he sees Ian’s frown, that is. Then he remembers. 

“Is this all a joke to you?” Ian asks, pulling away from the wall and running both his hands through his hair, clearly still annoyed. Mickey stands up and shakes his head no, but it’s not good enough for Ian who once again throws a punch, this time at the solid brick wall. It sounds like it hurts. 

Instead of getting more violent - or yelling or leaving - Ian pulls him into another kiss. Ignoring the fact that his dick was just in Mickey’s mouth, he uses his tongue while they kiss moving closer and closer together until their chests are touching and once again Ian is pressing one of his legs between both of Mickey’s. Only this time, Mickey is grinding against him too; feeling too good not to. He can’t ruin these pants, but he also can’t make himself stop yet because the pressure is too perfect. Ian’s touching his hair, still kissing him, letting Mickey grind against his leg without comment. 

“I’m so much better for you than that whore. Can’t you see that?” Ian asks, pulling away from the kiss. Mickey can, and says so, even though he doesn’t understand why Ian has to make that distinction.  _ Of course _ he’s better than Svetlana. What does he want, a tee-shirt that says, ‘Mickey’s bottom bitch - whores need not apply’?

“Yes, okay. You’re fucking better than her.” He says, still pinned against the wall and doing his best to get off on Ian’s leg - pants be damned.

“Better  _ for _ you.” Ian corrects him and pulls away. “Turn around.” Mickey does, and he works his pants down while Ian kisses his neck and pulls him into an embrace from behind. 

Instead of fucking him, Ian reaches around and takes Mickey’s dick into his hand, stroking it. His other arm wraps around Mickey’s midsection tightly, keeping their bodies close. 

Mickey doesn’t have to do anything but keep his legs from giving out. Doesn’t have to think about anything, only feel the things Ian is doing to him with his hand. It’s infinitely better than jerking himself off, even though he has no control over what the hand on his cock does. Ian knows him well enough now anyways. Knows exactly where to squeeze, the best time to let his thumb wander and slide against the tip, and even though this is the most basic thing they could be doing with their limited time together, Mickey isn’t going to last much longer. Especially not when Ian’s breathing roughly on the back of his neck, making all the short hairs there stand on end. 

He presses his ass back just to feel the firm pressure of Ian’s hips behind him, and then he’s really ready to come. For some reason the only thing his head, heart and body can all agree on is that Ian is the best thing, possibly the only good thing, to ever happen to him and he never wants to have sex with anyone that isn’t him. No piece of paper is ever going to change that. 

Instead of telling him this, Mickey stays as quiet as he can. He lets his head press against the wall, his hands clench around nothing but air, his toes curl in his newly shined shoes. Ian notices and starts to stroke him faster, but it’s not necessary. Mickey’s already there, cursing under his breath until there’s no air left in his lungs. Then gasping to bring in more so he can curse again. Ian stops stroking and just holds his dick while Mickey comes. A little on the floor, but most on the wall and none on his tuxedo. 

He pulls away, but Mickey stays leaning against the wall for another minute before he pulls up his pants too. He pushes his hair back into place, and gets his jacket from the floor and pulls that on too. They were quick, no one’s come in to get him, and as soon as this whole mess is over they can sneak away again. 

Behind where Ian’s pulling his own clothes back into place, there’s a small dent in the shelf he hit.

“Damn, Gallagher, I ought'a get you pissed off more often.”

“So what are we gonna do?” Ian asks, handing him a cigarette while he tucks his shirt back into place. “Tell everyone to leave?”

It must be so easy for Gallagher, on the other side of this; just talking about all the shit he wants like it’s going to happen and then forcing everyone else around him to perform the difficult reality checks he doesn’t want to.

“Naw, I gotta go get this shit over with. You can wait here for me.” 

If Ian can think of any good alternatives - the kind that don’t end up with Mickey homeless, broke, and alone - now would be a good time to say them, but he doesn’t. He just wants, like a child, and now that he can’t have what he wants he’s taking it out on the only person around still listening to him: Mickey.

Maybe that’s being uncharitable, but at a certain point, enough is enough.

“Why are you acting like I got a choice in this?” 

“This is bullshit. Listen to me Mickey, your dad is an evil, psychotic prick,” Ian says, and either he’s been listening to Mandy or he’s been telling her this stuff himself. “You’re just going to let him ruin your life?”

“You can grow the fuck up! Don’t act like you know a thing about my dad.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Not everybody gets to just-”

_ Just what? _

“Not everybody gets to blurt out how they fucking feel every minute.”

It’s not exactly where he wanted to end the conversation, but their time together is up. Mandy comes through the doors, everyone’s waiting for him, and Mickey has to get married now no matter what Ian thinks about it.

*-*-*

The wedding would be hard enough without Ian stubbornly refusing to leave, his very presence a threat he might do something stupid. It would be hard enough if Mandy didn’t get shitfaced twenty minutes after the ceremony, if Svetlana wasn’t hitting on everything with legs and drinking glass after glass of champagne because ‘the baby too small to know’, if Terry didn’t want to introduce the two of them to everyone he knows, most of whom Mickey’s met at least once before. 

It would be hard enough without all those things, but no one is going to give Mickey a break today.

They sign the papers as soon as the ceremony is over, and it feels exactly like every paper he ever had to sign for Juvie: mandatory, legally binding, and a worse deal for him than the person telling him to sign; in this case, Svetlana. After that, she isn’t interested in him at all. Which would be fine if she wasn’t hitting on the guests right in front of Terry, forcing Mickey to stay close so she doesn’t start something he’ll have to finish. 

Mandy is a complete mess, and he’s not even surprised she picked this day to self-destruct. She’s been so different ever since she met Ian, but when Mickey’s topping off his beer at the bar and hears two of the bridesmaids saying she’s in the bathroom blowing some guy, it’s like her freshman year all over again. 

At least Terry is too drunk now to recognize Svetlana among any of the other girls, and Mickey takes the opportunity to slip outside and have a smoke by the front door. As soon as possible, he’s going to grab her and get the hell out of here whether she wants to or not. For now, he’ll settle for a cigarette and a few minutes alone. 

He only gets one of those things because the guy from his kitchen all those weeks ago, when this wedding was nothing more than an abstract concept for him to agree to, is outside smoking when he gets there. No friend this time; he’s probably inside drinking, trying to score, or both. For a second when Mickey first sees the guy standing by the trash can, there’s a deep scowl on his face, but when he looks up and recognizes Mickey the groom, it’s replaced with a semi-natural looking smile.

“Look who it is!” He spreads his arms in a welcoming gesture, beer in one hand, cigarette in the other. “A brand new husband for Svetlana Yevgenivna. Excuse me, I mean Svetlana Milkovich of course.”

He’s clearly been drinking, and if he wants to start a fight he’ll have a better chance inside. Mickey lights his cigarette and leans against the building a few feet away from him. 

“For having married such a beautiful woman, you don’t look very happy Mikhailo.” 

On the hand holding the glass of beer, Mickey can see the glint of the man's own wedding band. 

“It’s just Mickey.” He says more because he’s irritated than that he cares. He’s looking towards the ground, and the man hunches over in front of him playfully like he’s trying to catch his eye, but waves Mickey off when he won't bite. He walks back to the trash can instead and throws his beer glass into the parking lot where it shatters. 

He’s obviously drunk and maybe upset, but it’s still a surprise when he throws back his head and lets out a scream somewhere between a howl and a yell. In the distance, a few dogs answer back with yowls of their own.

Mickey takes a drag of his cigarette and watches noncommittally. Just like Mandy, whatever this guy’s going through is not Mickey’s problem tonight. He’s got enough of his own to deal with already.

“What a nice night.” The guy turns and says as though he hadn’t been screaming just seconds ago. “Now I suppose you will take your beautiful bride home.”

Mickey shrugs. He’s not going to get baited into a conversation like that.

“What is the matter? Don’t you have a tongue, or is it that you will save it for later?” He makes the same gesture with his fingers and tongue that Iggy had earlier, only there’s a lot more malice in his face when he does it. For whatever reason, that’s the last straw for Mickey tonight. He throws his own half-full glass at the man’s feet where it splashes beer and glass onto the cuffs of his pants.

Whether they would have gotten into an actual fist fight or not isn't clear, but before Mickey can make another move, the front door of the hall bursts open startling them both. 

Out of it stumbles an extremely drunk Ian being half-held, half-carried by Lip, who Mickey didn’t even know was here. 

“Mickey, I hate you!” Ian yells the second he sees him, and lurches forward almost pulling himself and his brother to the ground. 

“Get him out of here!” Mickey snaps at Lip, but Ian seems to have more to say.

“You fucked up  _ everything _ .”

Just to top off this horrible, shit-show of a night, Mickey can see that he’s crying. 

“Go home, Ian. You’re drunk.”

“I fucking hate you.”

If only that were true. Everything would be so much simpler. 

“Get him out of here.” He says again, but Lip is looking at him with the kind of disgust people usually reserve for rapists and pedophiles. He’s struggling to keep Ian upright, but still takes a few seconds to find the words he wants to say.

“You’re pathetic. You and your fucking sister. I hope you both rot in hell.” He spits towards Mickey’s feet, but finally starts dragging Ian away, down the street, back towards home. Ian’s not going quietly. Just before Lip manages to drag him out of the parking lot, he turns around and calls out Mickey’s name, but Mickey turns his back on him and heads towards the building instead. 

Infected by everyone else’s terrible mood, Mickey drops his cigarette on the ground and screams, “Fuck!” at the top of his lungs until his throat cramps and he’s out of breath. Then, just for good measure, he punches the wall of the dance hall as hard as he can. 

His hand will hurt for the rest of the week, but he doesn’t break anything. At least, not that he knows of; he never goes to the clinic to get it checked out. 

“Is that a friend of yours?” The man asks, looking amused by Mickey’s troubles. 

“No.” Mickey says, and he goes back inside so he can get his bride and leave this hellish night behind before anyone else decides to start shit with him. 

*-*-*

After the wedding he knows Ian will be mad, but they’ve been angry with each other so much lately, it never really crosses his mind that this time will be any different. 

Svetlana’s been staying in his room ever since they told everyone the baby is his and got engaged, so there isn’t much to adjust to with married life. The night of the wedding, he has to carry her in from the car and she sleeps all the way into the next afternoon. The day after that, he and Joey pull a smash-and-grab job. Nothing changes, just like he told Ian it wouldn’t, but he hasn’t seen Gallagher to tell him ‘I told you so’. 

Every chance he gets, Mickey walks or drives by the Kash-and-Grab, but it’s never open anymore. He even takes his chances one early morning when Terry is passed out on the couch, and watches the Gallagher house from across the street. He waits for more than an hour, but Ian never comes out. 

So he waits - irritably, impatiently, anxiously - and finally, four days after the wedding, Ian shows up. Seeing him is like finding food in the cupboards after days of them being empty, like getting out of Juvie again, or discovering a young Mandy hiding in the closet and realizing she hasn’t run away after all. It’s comfort and relief, because things have been so strained with Ian lately, Mickey was starting to believe it might actually be over for good this time. 

Ian doesn’t stay long.

He still wants the exact same thing he’s always wanted. For Mickey to commit, to go all in, to leave everything else behind just so Ian knows how serious he is. Because he can’t just trust that when Mickey says ‘don’t go’, he fucking means it.

Ian says he’s going to join the army. Four years.  _ Minimum. _

There’s no reason to doubt him. When Ian wants something, he looks at all the things he needs to do, and just does them. His grades, his body, work, ROTC, recommendations. Ian has been working towards this since the day Mickey met him, but there was supposed to be more  _ time _ . 

He acts like he wants Mickey to convince him to stay, then doesn’t give him enough time to think of the right words to do it.

Then he’s just gone. 

*-*-*

Two days after Ian’s last visit, Mickey’s leaving the house for smokes - he has to get both his and Svetlana’s separately because they can’t even agree on a fucking brand of cigarettes. He’s barely more than a few steps out of his yard when Lip Gallagher appears from behind one of the overpass’s concrete pillars, calling out to him. A homeless man pushing a cart full of garbage bags glances over at them, then continues on his way.

“Mickey, where is he?!” Lip doesn’t sound drunk, but he’s yelling just the same. When he comes up, Mickey has to push him back to keep him out of his face.

“You know where he is so just tell me!” Lip yells again.

“He’s in the army, asshole!”

“He can’t enlist. He’s too young.”

“Then I don’t know what you want me to fucking say.” Mickey turns to leave, but Lip grabs him by the arm. 

“Just tell me where he is!”

“I already fucking-”

“HE’S NOT IN THE ARMY!”

Mickey’s never heard a grown man’s voice crack like that, but Lip doesn’t look very grown right now. His eyes are bloodshot like he’s been up all night, and maybe crying too, and his whole face is turned down in a frown that’s all sadness. Mickey doesn’t want to see him like this so he pulls his arm out of his grip and starts to walk away again. 

“This is all your fault.” Lip says quietly behind him. 

“The fuck did you just say?”

“I said you’re a worthless fucking coward. The worst thing to ever happen to him, and  _ he left to get away from you _ !”

Across the street, a homeless man stands beside his belongings and watches with interest as two young men start a fight under the overpass. The one with light, curly hair takes an early lead, pulling the darker-haired one to the ground and wailing on him like a man possessed. The other man recovers quickly, kicks the feet out from under Curly, stands up and delivers several more well-aimed kicks until the curly-haired one doesn’t attempt to get up again. Then he spits blood onto the ground and walks away without a look back. After a minute, the young man on the ground pulls himself up and does the same. 

Nothing unusual. Just another morning in the Yards.

*-*-*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end of season three so the next post will be the first chapter of season 4. I'm excited for that season :)


End file.
